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THE MAIL WAGON MYSTERY 



































. 

















































































The 

MAIL WAGON 

MYSTERY 

By MAY JUSTUS 
Pictured by 
LUCIA PATTON 



ALBERT WHITMAN & COMPANY 

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 194° 

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Copyright, 1940, by 
Albert Whitman & Company 


Th 

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p &iH he U - S - A - 


AUG -11S40 

COPYRIGHT OFFICE 


C>Ci A 1 43520C^_ 




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To 

Margaret Raymond 
because l admire her as a writer, 
and treasure her as a friend 

























TABLE OF CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Over the Mountain. 17 

Trouble at Far Beyant. 26 

New Kin . 36 

Out on Bail. 45 

A New Friend and a New Job. 51 

The Warning. 65 

Good News and Bad News... 76 

Something Turns Up. 83 

Dick’s Story. 96 

The House on Orchard Hill....104 

Trouble on the Trail...116 

The Meeting at the Mine.129 

An Unexpected Guest.,.145 

The Day After.... 157 

Another Runaway. 177 

Home on Orchard Hill.196 


















I 





( 


















FULL PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS 


COLOR PLATES 

PAGE 


“It’s all us womenfolk at Middle Mine at 
eight o'clock”. 6 

She looked up to see a flash of red in the bushes.. 16 

BLACK AND WHITE PLATES 

“I came to meet you uns—you,” Bob said. 31 

It wasn’t work at all, but a very fine sort of play.. 61 

“Tell me, Mary Ann,” said Harriet, softly. 89 

Then they went out to inspect the apple orchard.. 109 

“We’ve got to start right now”.125 

“Listen to me, you menfolks, my kin and 

neighbors” .135 

Mr. Jones was now sleeping on a pallet bed.153 

Mr. Coomer took a step toward the cot.169 

Billy Boy ran pelhmell through the yard.187 

Granny triumphantly added a good number 
of bills . 


199 










































She looked tip to see a flash of red in the bushes 













Chapter I 

OVER THE MOUNTAIN 


I N the dining room of the parsonage, the Murrays 
were eating supper by the flickering light from 
three inches of rose-colored candle. The candle 
was not a festive note—it was serving from necessity, 
since the Light and Power Company had cut off the 
lights the day before. 

“Let’s take an oil can to church next Sunday and 
take up a contribution,’’ suggested Dick who was 
thirteen, and had a sense of humor which tempted 
him at times beyond the border line of perfect pro¬ 
priety. 


*7 







i8 


The Mail- Wagon Mystery 


“Why, Dick!” said eighteetvyear'old Harriet, who 
tried to speak to him severely and reprove him in a 
grave, sisterly way, and failed to do her full duty. 
After all, it was Dick's fun and foolishness which had 
relieved the tension of these trying days. It was he 
who made fun of their makeshifts at housekeeping 
all by themselves. It was he who thought of cheer' 
ful news for Mother, and who assured Father in every 
letter that things were all right and getting better! 

A month ago Mother had become ill, so ill that it 
had been decided best to take her to Asheville, where 
she could have the best of medical care. She was 
still there and Father was with her. There was some 
improvement, very slow, but sure, according to 
Father’s letters. However, no homecoming was in 
sight yet. Meanwhile the rest of the family, the 
Murray Six, as the neighbors called them, were hav' 
ing a hard time of it making ends meet. The neigh' 
bors were kind. They contributed food from their 
own little patches and gardens, and one who had a 
cow gave milk for Billy Boy. But there were so many 
expenses for which there must be ready money. 
Harriet often wondered how her mother had made 
such a tiny income answer the endless demands upon 



Over the Mountain 


19 


it. Mother had always managed; always she seemed 
to be able to provide for just one more need. But 
Mother had had much practice in the gentle art of 
economy, and Harriet lacked her experience. After 
she had totally failed at first to make the household 
expenses and the money come out even, she had 
found a little book marked budget, hanging on a nail 
in her mother’s room. This contained a plan for 
spending which helped her out, and since then the 
management had gone more smoothly. 

Still there were numerous difficulties. The budget 
notes had no plan for such emergencies as Nancy’s 
need for a graduation dress, or shoes for John and 
Joan who being twins, wore out their clothes to- 
gether, as they did other things. Nancy’s dress had 
taken the light money last month. Now the new 
shoes had taken it again, hence the need for eating 
their supper tonight by the light of an old Christ' 
mas candle. 

“Any more bread?” asked John. 

“Or soup?” added Joan. 

“No more bread,” replied Harriet, “but some very 
nice hot potatoes.” She went to the kitchen after 
them. When she came back Dick and Nancy had 



20 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


their heads close together over a sheet of paper. 

“Oh, is it a letter from Father?” she asked. 

“No, from some of our relatives,” giggled Nancy, 
“and such a letter —printed with a lead pencil, and 
such funny spelling!” 

“It’s a nice letter,” Dick asserted. “From Uncle 
Matthew, addressed on the envelope to the whole 
family, and you stop making fun of it, Miss Fancy 
Nancy!” As he spoke he snatched the letter away 
from Nancy’s critical inspection, and regarded her 
with scowling looks across the dining table. 

“When did it come?” Harriet asked quickly to 
change the trend of discussion. As elder sister she 
often had to serve as a timely mediator between 
quick-tempered, belligerent Dick and teasing, provok¬ 
ing Nancy. 

The letter had come in the late mail, and the post¬ 
master had just stopped in with it on his way home. 
Harriet took it closer to the light which was burning 
near the candlestick socket. 

“I will read it aloud,” she told the group. “Some 
of you have not heard it.” 

Dick and Nancy settled down to listen with the 
others. The twins leaned forward, and Billy Boy 



Over the Mountain 


21 


stopped sucking his spoon for a minute or two. 
Dear Children: 

We uns have just hearn tell about the trouble in 
yore family, and are mighty distressed about it. Can’t 
you all come and live with us till times are better? 
There is room for all, and you are more than welcome. 
Write us when to look for you. The train stops at 
Slab Town. Hit’s ten miles further to Far Beyant, 
and I’ll meet you all with the wagon. 

Your Uncle Matthew Murray. 

A moment’s silence followed. Then Dick spoke: 

“It is a nice letter, isn’t it?” He ignored Nancy, 
and addressed himself to the rest of them. 

“It’s a very kind letter,” said Harriet. “From Uncle 
Matthew, Father’s brother. Why, Dick, you are 
named for him, don’t you know—Richard Matthew 
Murray?” 

Dick assumed a superior air. “Yes, and he’s a big 
hunter!” he boasted. “He’s the best shot in the whole 
country. I’ve heard Dad tell of shooting matches 
where Uncle Matt got one prize right after the other. 
I’d like to go to Far Beyant. Dad has always prom' 
ised me.” 



22 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


“I want to go, too!” John announced. 

“I want to go,” echoed Joan. 

“I want to go right now,” declared Billy Boy, the 
youngest member of the household. 

Harriet smiled over at Nancy, but Nancy was not 
ready to vote with the rest. There was something 
in her make-up which sought distinction by a subtle 
aloofness. It was as though Nancy drew a circle 
about herself, a circle invisible to the eyes, but as 
definite as a wall of iron. 

“Excuse me,” she said with a slow, sweeping glance 
that came to rest a moment on the candle. “I’ll see 
if I can find another candle end,” and she slipped 
away from the table. 

After Nancy was gone the others fell to talking 
with much excitement and enthusiasm over Uncle 
Matt’s invitation. 

“I believe you are ready to start to Far Beyant 
before breakfast tomorrow morning!” Harriet de- 
dared. 

“Don’t you want to go?” Dick asked her. 

“I’m as ready as any of you,” she replied. “But 
we can’t leave in a hurry. First of all, we’ve got to 
write Father, although I think Uncle Matt and he 



Over the Mountain 


23 


must have written each other before Uncle Matt 
wrote us. And while we are waiting to hear if 
Father has any objections to this plan of going to 
the Smoky Mountains, we’ll be getting ready so that 
we can start right away.” 

“Hooray!” cried Dick. “That’s what I say. You 
write the letter, Harriet. We’ll all sign our names.” 

Nancy came back with her candle end. It was a 
blue one, so Harriet knew it was a souvenir from her 
birthday party. 

When, however, Nancy continued to maintain 
silence about the invitation from Uncle Matt, Harriet 
suggested, “Why don’t you all go to bed right away 
and sleep on the plans we’ve been making? I’ll see 
to the dishes. The moon is up and bright enough 
so that you won’t need any other light.” 

Dick and Joan and John rose and pushed back 
their chairs noisily. Billy Boy slid down from his 
chair. And with an excited “Goodnight,” they scam' 
pered away. Only Nancy lingered a moment looking 
thoughtfully at the blue bit of candle. Then she 
picked it up and held it out to her sister. 

“Take it,” she said. “You’re more likely to need 
it than I.” And she was gone. 



24 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


Queer Nancy. Capricious, changeable Nancy! 

As Harriet stopped to pick up a spoon, she saw a 
slip of paper on the floor. It was an additional page 
to Uncle Matt’s letter that no one had noticed. She 
read it in the candelight, then again, and yet again 
to be sure she understood it. 

“I think I’ll keep this to myself awhile,” she 
thought, as she folded it carefully and tucked it into 
her apron pocket. “If I tried to explain to the others, 
I couldn’t make them understand. I had better keep 
it for a secret.” 

After the others were all in bed, Harriet sat by a 
window, letting the night wind cool her hot face, 
and the peace of the night steal within her. The 
thoughts that came were long, long thoughts. She 
alone, of all the children, knew the reason why her 
father’s people were almost total strangers. Mother 
had told her the story one day. Mother had been a 
Coomer, and between the Coomer and the Murray 
families an old grudge had existed, dating back to a 
long-ago quarrel over a disputed land boundary and 
a lost deed—or a stolen one. A Coomer had accused 
a Murray of stealing his land deed for the purpose 
of adding to his own territory. Thus the ancient 



Over the Mountain 


25 


feud had started. From that former day till the pres- 
ent the families had been enemies. 

“Stealing Murrays,” and “Lying Coomers,” were 
the terms they used in speaking of each other. 
Mother had said. But Father had married Mother 
in spite of all this, in spite of all protest. His whole 
family had been against him, just as they had always 
been against his queer notion of getting an education. 
All, that is, but Granny Murray. Granny Murray, 
Father’s mother, had stood up for him, had taken 
his part. And Granny had taken up with Mother, 
had opened her heart and home to her. But Mother 
hadn’t been happy there with the Murrays, never 
seeing her own family, and Father had taken her 
away. 

This was all that Mother had told Harriet, but 
the girl had understood why Father went back home 
alone once a year to visit his mother. Mother’s own 
parents had both died since she and Father left the 
mountains, and she never seemed to want to go back. 

And now came this invitation. Uncle Matt’s name 
was signed to it, but on this other bit of paper which 
Harriet had found was a postscript: “Don’t be afraid 
to come. Granny.” 




Chapter II 

TROUBLE AT FAR BEYANT 


Harriet settled back against the red plush seat with 
Billy Boy close beside her. She looked behind and 
ahead of her. Yes, there they all were, well started 
on their brand-new adventure. Was it barely a week 
ago that Uncle Matt had sent them an invitation to 
visit the Murray kinfolk awhile? It was hard to 
realise it. So many things had come to pass in the 
week that was behind them. 

Such a mad scramble as they had all had to get 
themselves ready! New clothes were not necessary, 
but money must be raised to pay for tickets, and they 


26 







Trouble at Far Bey ant 


31 


must leave behind them no unpaid bills. That had 
been Father’s one stipulation in his letter granting 
them permission to go. He had spared them a little 
extra money, but nearly all their expenses had been 
met by dint of hard work and ingenious planning. 

Dick had sold his tennis racket, boxing gloves and 
bicycle, and mowed the yards of seven neighbors as 
his labor contribution. The twins picked strawberries 
several days and even peddled them on a commission. 
Nancy had at last grown enthusiastic about the trip 
and had found a way to earn some money by wash¬ 
ing dishes once a day in the village hotel. They had 
all worked hard, but happily. Now they had several 
hours before them to rejoice over their victory 
against adverse circumstances. For awhile at least the 
family budget would cease to be a problem. For 
awhile they were all as free as gypsies. . . . 

“All off for Slab Town!’’ 

Harriet jumped to her feet at the voice that awoke 
her from the light sleep into which she had fallen. 

The conductor paused beside her seat. “I’ll help 
you with the baggage.” 

“Oh, thank you,” Harriet replied. Billy Boy was 
still napping, but Dick and the twins were already 



28 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


up, their various bags and bundles all in hand so that 
there would be no delay in making a rapid exit from 
the car as soon as it should stop. 

“Any one coming to meet you?” The conductor 
now had sleepy Billy Boy by the hand and was look' 
ing down on the group with fatherly concern. 

“Oh, I think so, I hope so,” Harriet answered. 
“We are expecting our Uncle Matt Murray to meet 
us.” 

The conductor made a queer sort of exclamation. 
“I don’t think—he’ll be here,” he said. “I’ll ask the 
agent to look after you, though.” Harriet looked up 
quickly, but his face was suddenly turned the other 
way. 

“Please tell me what you mean,” she begged, but 
the conductor was already striding down the aisle 
with Billy Boy in his arms and the others following 
in his wake. Harriet stumbled along last, trying to 
steady herself as the car bumped and lurched to a 
standstill, and with a sudden panic surging over her. 

“All out!” the conductor called, looking over his 
shoulder before he descended the steps. 

The Murrays obeyed his order, and were on the 
ground before he had time to assist one of them. 




Trouble^ at Far Beyant 


29 


“See here, Miss,” the conductor said, speaking in 
an embarrassed manner, “I guess I had better break 
the news—tell you why your uncle won’t be here. 
It was in the papers yesterday morning, but I reckon 
you didn’t see it, or you’d have known about the 
mail robbery between here and Far Beyant.” 

“No—oh, no,” gasped Harriet, “but what has 
Uncle Matt—” 

“He’s the mail wagon driver,” the conductor said. 
“He has carried the mail from Slab Town to Far 
Beyant ever since they got their post office out there. 
Nothing like this ever happened before. I know your 
Uncle Matt, and I don’t believe he’s guilty of taking 
the money—” 

“Money?” breathed Harriet. It was getting worse 
and worse. 

“The miners’ money,” explained the conductor. 
“You see they get it once a week, and it’s sent in 
cash because there is no bank where they can get 
checks cashed. Well, when the mail got in at Far 
Beyant on Saturday the special bag with the miners’ 
money was missing, and they know it left Slab Town, 
so the robbery took place between here and Far 
Beyant. And that’s all they’ve found out yet.” 



3° 


The MaU Wagon Mystery 


“And Uncle Matt—where is he?” 

“In jail,” the man answered. “It’s a shame. But 
you had to hear about it, and I’m letting my train 
wait because I felt that I ought to let you know.” 

“Oh, yes—oh, thank you—thank you,” stammered 
Harriet. She had never felt more helpless than in 
that moment, standing there by the little yellow sta' 
tion with few signs of civilisation in sight, and the 
great mountains looming beyond. Just then she 
looked up at a slight sound. A few yards away stood 
a tall boy clad in blue overalls and a jumper, chewing 
the end of a long, green switch, and digging a heel 
in the cinders. 

“There’s Matt’s boy now,” said the conductor. 
“Bob, here’s some kin come to see you. This young 
lady is your cousin. The others are around the cor' 
ner.” During the few moments’ conversation be' 
tween Harriet and the conductor, Dick and the oth' 
ers had run off on a tour of investigation. 

The boy called Bob came forward now, and the 
conductor hopped onto the steps of the car, waving 
a friendly hand in good'bye. 

“I came to meet you uns—you,” Bob said. Then 
a wave of crimson flooded his face, and he took off 





































Trouble at Tar Bey ant 


33 


his old straw hat with one hand, as he somewhat 
awkwardly held out the other one. 

“I am so glad to see you,” Harriet said. “I—have 
just heard about your father—Uncle Matt. Oh, I 
am so sorry! I’m afraid we ought to go right back—” 

“What do you mean go back?” It was Dick, re' 
turned from around the station house, astonishment 
and alarm upon his face. “What’s happened?” 

Harriet started to explain, then faltered. It seemed 
so cruel to be saying that Uncle Matt was in jail. 
But Bob quickly forgot his shyness and took up the 
explanation in his own fashion. 

“The money sack was stolen, all right, but Pappy, 
he never took it, and nobody thinks he did but them 
lowdown, lyin’ Coomers. We all mean to get to' 
gether and find out the person who did it. Nearly 
everybody in Far Beyant has got up a petition to get 
Pappy out o’ jail.” 

“Come on, everybody,” he then called almost 
cheerfully. And when Nancy and Joan and John and 
Billy Boy hurried up, he led the way to the wagon 
which he had brought over the mountain. After the 
luggage was stored away, they settled themselves 
down into the wagon. The straw was a good shock 



M. 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


absorber as they jounced over the long, bumpy road 
across Thunderhead Mountain. Dick sat on the front 
seat with Bob, while Harriet and the other children 
burrowed places for themselves in the straw in the 
back part of the wagon. In hurried whispers she 
told Nancy about the trouble that had come upon 
their Uncle Matt. But Nancy said little in reply, and 
Harriet soon returned to her own agitated thoughts. 

She felt overcome with this new problem thrust 
upon her. It did not seem right to push themselves 
upon their kin in this time of trouble. What ought 
she to do? Second thought told her clearly that they 
could not go back to the parsonage for a while at 
least. For the church had planned to take in a new 
minister who would serve them in the absence of 
their regular pastor. Return being impossible, she 
could not think of any possible course but to continue 
along the way they had started. Already the wagon 
was going on and up a rocky road that was a little 
better than a trail. “Good-bye,” Harriet’s heart kept 
saying to the old life, the familiar experiences, the 
true-and-tried path of existence. Beyond them— 
what? 

Nancy touched her hand. “Harriet, isn’t it thrill- 



Trouble at Far Beyant 


35 


ing?” There was no depression on Nancy’s face. 

Harriet drew her hand away. How could Nancy 
be light-hearted in the face of Uncle Matt’s trouble, 
and Bob’s and Granny’s? “I think it’s dreadful,” she 
whispered. “What if it were our own father, Nancy, 
who was suspected of—stealing money?” 

Nancy’s face sobered. “Oh,” she exclaimed, and 
looking off into the distance, she was quiet for a long 
moment. Then once more she turned to Harriet. 

“It is just so hard to realize that they are our peo¬ 
ple,” she explained in a moment. “They seem so— 
so different somehow; like people you read about in 
stories; kind of not real.” 


“Well, they are real,” answered her sister. “And 
even if they do live on Thunderhead Mountain, they 
are our kin. Don’t forget that.” 







Chapter III 
NEW KIN 


Harriet awoke next morning in a big old-fashioned 
four-poster with gay-colored patchwork quilts on it. 
By her side lay Nancy, her curly head still pillowed 
on her arm in deep sleep. Harriet turned softly, so 
as not to waken her, and surveyed the little room in 
which they had slept. It was the attic of a big log 
cabin. The sloping roof came down till she could 
touch it easily, and the only walls were the gable 
ends. In the east wall there was a little window, and 
through this the morning sun was streaming. Al¬ 
though it was midsummer, a cool breeze was blowing 
through the window, and the air was pleasantly fra¬ 
grant with pine and the odor of wild honeysuckle. 

36 






New Kin 


37 


Harriet slipped so quietly from the bed that she 
made scarcely any sound. Dressing in a hurry, she 
found her way down the narrow, steep stairway and 
came at length to a big room which served as kitchen 
and dining room in one. Here the family were eating 
breakfast. Washing her face at the washbowl on the 
shelf outside, she hurried to the table, and greeted her 
relatives with a smile and a cheery, “Good morning, 
everybody!” 

“Howdy, honey,” replied a little old woman, sit' 
ting at the foot of the table. This was Granny Mur' 
ray, "Father’s own mother, with a face as brown as a 
hickory nut and covered with fine, sharply etched 
wrinkles. But the smile on her lips was kindly, and 
the glance of her black eyes gentle. 

No one sat at the head of the table. There an 
empty plate was waiting and an empty chair was 
pushed in as if some one were expected. This, as 
Aunt Lissie had whispered last night, was Uncle 
Matt’s place, and Granny would allow no one else 
to eat there. Bob looked at Harriet as she sat down, 
and politely passed her hot biscuits. Aunt Lissie 
offered her plum preserves, and Granny handed her 
a dish of honey. Harriet’s heart warmed to these 



38 


The Mad Wagon Mystery^ 


people whom she had never seen before last night. 
How many times she had heard her father describe 
this mountain home of his childhood, tell stories of 
their early struggles, and praise the fine spirit of this 
little old woman who was his mother. 

“Where’re the rest of us?” Harriet asked. 

“Still asleep,” replied Granny. “And don’t any of 
you ’uns wake ’em, or I’ll wear you out with a hick' 
ory stick!” This threat which sounded so formidable 
was uttered with a gentle tongue and a smile that 
betrayed its meaning. 

Harriet smiled back. “You are awfully good to us. 
When we learned of Uncle Matt’s trouble, we—that 
is, I—felt perhaps we ought not to come on, for 
fear of adding to your worry.” 

A shadow passed over Granny’s face. “If you 
hadn’t come on, I’d have worried. To think o’ you 
young ’uns all there by yourselves. We ’uns may not 
have so much to offer, and I guess ye’re all used to a 
sight better, but the bunch of ye needs lookin’ atter. 
We can do that, I reckon. I been lookin’ out fer 
folks all o’ my life. Yes, ye done right to come on, 
honey.” 

Bob had not spoken since Harriet sat down. Now 



New Kin 


39 


he finished his breakfast, and pushing back his plate, 
arose. 

“I’m goin’ up on the mountain to pick huckle* 
berries today. Want to come along?” 

“Oh, yes. I’d love to. May I, Granny?” It seemed 
natural to turn to her. Granny nodded, and handed 
her a basket. 

“Look out fer rattlesnakes,” she said briefly. “And 
be back here by high noon. We’ll make jam after 
dinner.” 

Now Dick appeared in the kitchen door, looking 
very sheepish at the sight of the table which told 
him he had missed the time for breakfast. But Granny 
bade Aunt Lissie bring hot bread, and began to make 
a place ready for him. 

“Sorry I’m late,” Dick apologized. 

“You won’t be agin,” Granny told him. “We’re 
all late this day, but we’ll be caught up with every* 
thing tomorrow. I’m always up afore daybreak my* 
self, and the rest ain’t slow to foller.” 

“Where you two going?” asked Dick, eyeing the 
berry baskets. 

When Harriet told him, he was determined to go 
too, declaring that he'd rather go without breakfast 



40 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


than miss the fun of berry picking. But Granny took 
him by the shoulder and marched him toward the 
table. “You’ll set your feet under that table and eat,’’ 
she commanded sternly and briefly. 

Harriet smiled as Dick obeyed. How much those 
tones reminded her of Father when he was taking 
them to task for a piece of mischief! Mother was so 
gentle in reproof and punishment that offenses of a 
serious nature were naturally relegated to Father’s 
jurisdiction. Yet he was kind too, even in his sever' 
ity, kind and always understanding. One sensed the 
rightness of his judgment, the fairness of his deci¬ 
sions, and none of his children doubted his love or 
questioned his justice. 

A little later the trio of berry pickers was winding 
up the mountain, the dewy grass beneath their feet, 
the swaying pines about them, and the blue summer 
sky over all. It was a pleasant morning, and the 
mountain had lost its forbidding aspect, the somber, 
threatening shadow which it had worn in the late 
afternoon of yesterday. Harriet looked around her, 
and drew a deep breath of the piny air. 

“Ye needn’t be lookin’ fer berries yet. They grow 
on a spur away over there.” And Bob’s hand pointed. 



Alew Kin 


41 


Harriet laughed and did not explain that she was 
looking merely for beauty. Soon they came to the 
berry patch. On a sunny slope of the mountain it 
lay like a hidden fairy orchard, surrounded by big 
gray boulders and gnarled old wind-beaten trees. The 
huckleberries were abundant. One could gather 
them in great handfuls, and the picking went on mer¬ 
rily. Already Bob and Dick were great friends, chat¬ 
ting away together. Harriet let them have the con¬ 
versation to themselves for it was all about dogs and 
hunting, and wild honey and bee trees. Of a sudden 
they heard a dog barking madly down in the hollow, 
and Bob raised his head. 

“That’s Blinker—yes, sir, that’s Blinker. I bet he’s 
got somethin’ treed down there. Let’s go down and 
find him.” 

The invitation was meant for Dick. But Harriet 
did not feel slighted. Contentedly she went on pick¬ 
ing berries while the two boys dashed down the 
mountain to answer the dog’s bark. 

A few minutes after they had disappeared, she 
heard a little rustle in the bushes, and looked up to 
see a flash of red in the bushes near her. 

“Hello!” she said quickly, as a girl’s startled face 



42 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


peered out from a red sunbonnet that matched her 
dress. Then the figure turned as if for immediate 
flight. 

“Oh, please don’t go!’’ Harriet called out again. 
“This is such a good patch of berries. You can soon 
fill your bucket here—mine is nearly full already.’’ 

As she spoke she went forward, and the girl did 
not stir as Harriet approached her. Pushing the bon' 
net back on her head, the newcomer regarded Harriet 
with a direct scrutiny that was more than a little 
embarrassing. In a moment, however, the girl seemed 
to find in Harriet’s face that which satisfied her, and 
she smiled shyly. 

“I oughtn’t to stay. This patch is your finding,” 
she said. 

Harriet noticed that she spoke in the slurred drawl 
of her own mountain people, but there was a studied 
correctness in her speech, too, like that of a hard' 
learned lesson. 

“Oh, no,” Harriet told her quickly. “It was my 
cousin Bob who found it. It is his by right of dis' 
covery, I suppose. But there are more berries than 
we can gather. See, my basket is nearly full. And 
the boys’ are ready for heaping. I’ll have them piled 



New Kin 


43 


by the time they get back. They have gone to the 
hollow after Blinker.” 

Glancing at the face near her own now, Harriet 
saw that the cheek beneath the bonnet’s ruffle was 
quite crimson. The girl must be a very shy person, 
Harriet decided. 

“Let’s introduce ourselves to each other,” she said 
cordially. “My name is Harriet Murray. We came 
to Far Beyant just yesterday, on our first visit to our 
father’s people.” 

“I’m—glad to meet you,” said the other girl, as 
if she were recalling a formula learned in a book and 
almost forgotten. “You are kinfolks of mine, too I 
reckon, if you are Preacher Murray’s daughter. I’m 
his niece, Mary Ann Coomer.” 

“Oh,” cried Harriet, “I am glad. I have heard 
about kinfolks always—but I’ve never really had any, 
not to know or visit, or have for friends. We’ll—” 

From somewhere above them a call interrupted: 
“Ma'ry! Ma-a-ry A'amn!” 

The girl adjusted her bonnet. “That’s Mammy— 
my mother—calling. I’ll have to go, and don’t tell 
anyone you have seen me. Don’t let on to anybody. 
Good'bye!” And she vanished into the bushes. 



44 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


For long moments, Harriet stood looking in the 
direction in which the girl had disappeared. So that 
was what all the family hatred and the feud meant, 
here in the mountains! She and this girl couldn’t be 
friends. Harriet pursed her lips and frowned. Uncle 
Matt in jail, and now this. 

She turned back to her berry picking, but very 
few berries dropped into her pail. And when the 
boys came up with Blinker, quietly and soberly she 
followed them home. 





Chapter IV 
OUT ON BAIL 

The rest of the family were already at dinner by 
the time they got in. There was no vacant seat now 
at the table, for Uncle Matt had come home. Han 
riet was sure she would have known him anywhere 
—he looked so much like her father, almost enough 
like him to be his twin. The only difference was that 
Uncle Matt had a little more gray about the temples, 
and his skin was several shades browner because of 
his daily life in the outdoors. 

As the three entered the room, he rose from the 
table, shook hands cordially with Harriet, and then 


45 




46 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


with Dick and Bob. “I’m glad to meet ye,” he said 
to his niece and nephew, and to Bob: “How are ye, 
son?” 

Then he sat down again and went on with his 
dinner. There was no excitement at all, no bub' 
bling, joyous welcome in the air for him who had 
just come home. But Granny’s face wore a smile of 
deep content, Aunt Lissie hummed a little song as 
she passed back and forth from table to stove, wait¬ 
ing on them all. As for Bob, his eyes never left his 
father’s face, and it was plain to see that there were 
things he wanted to know. But he forebore ques¬ 
tioning. After awhile, however. Uncle Matt said al¬ 
most casually that he was out on bail. His trial would 
come up later, he explained. Meanwhile, to show 
their faith in him all of the Murray kin and many 
neighbors had made up money—a hundred dollars— 
for the lawyer whom he would need. 

But Uncle Matt had hopes that there would be no 
need for the sum. “Somebody took that mine money, 
and it’s likely somebody else knows the guilty one,” 
he told them. “And time tells a lot of tales.” 

“It was somebody mighty smart,” said Bob, “to 
figger out a way to steal that bag off a movin’ wagon. 



Out on Bail 


47 


But that’s how it must have been done, certain sure.” 

“Looks like you’d have seen the thief, Uncle 
Matt,” spoke up John. 

Uncle Matt laughed. “Looks like I would,” he 
answered, “but I guess I wasn’t lookin’ both ways.” 

The others all laughed in relief, and John blushed 
under his screen of freckles. “I wish I could have 
been along,” he said to cover his embarrassment. 

Dick had been eating huckleberry pie, apparently 
giving his complete attention to the food before him. 
Now he looked up eagerly and declared, “I’ve got an 
idea about how the fellow that did it managed it. It 
just came into my head.” 

Nancy looked at him with amusement. “Don’t be 
too sure it was an idea you felt,” she said. “I rapped 
you with this shoofly stick—that’s what you felt.” 

As she spoke, Nancy waved the shoo-fly stick, 
which was a little green bough used to whisk the flies 
from the food. Dick glowered, but did not retort 
angrily, as he certainly would have done at home. 

“Don’t tease, Nancy,” Harriet said. “Tell us, 
Dick.” 

Nancy’s lack of respect was victorious. Without 
another word, Dick went on eating his pie. 



48 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


Later, however, he sought out Harriet as she 
picked peas in the garden. “I’ll tell you, Harriet, if 
you’ll promise not to tell,” he told her. 

Harriet promised. 

“I just happened to think of that book I had last 
summer when I broke my leg,” he said. “You know, 
the one that was called The Missing Mail —you read 
it out loud to me.” 

“The one about the bandits who held up the wag¬ 
ons with the mail and robbed the money bags?” 

Dick nodded. “Yes. And don’t you remember the 
chapter where they robbed the bag of gold from a 
wagon while it moved down Rocky Gulch? And the 
wagon kept right on going?” 

Harriet straightened up from the row of peas, and 
looked at her brother. “Of course I remember. But 
what has that got to do with Uncle Matt?” 

“Maybe nothing at all,” Dick replied. “But what 
I happened to think of was that the road where 
Uncle Matt went was a lot like the Rocky Gulch road 
and a robber could have hooked up the money bag 
with a long hook just like those bandits did.” 

Slowly Harriet shook her head. “I don’t think so, 
Dick. Besides, suppose somebody did do it that way. 



Out on Bail 


49 


it wouldn’t help Uncle Matt any unless you could 
find out who it was.” 

“But you’ve got to start some place, Harriet,” Dick 
said patiently. “I’m going to tell Bob.” 

“Look here, Dick,” his sister said seriously, “don’t 
you go getting Granny and Uncle Matt and Aunt 
Lissie stirred up with your book notions. Tell Bob 
if you want to, but keep it a secret. Anyway,” she 
concluded persuasively, “a secret’s lots more fun.” 

“All right,” said Dick gruffly, “I’ll have it a secret. 
But it might have happened that way, Harriet.” 

That afternoon they had a letter from Father who 
reported their mother’s condition improved. She was 
still in the hospital, but it was hoped by those in 
charge there that she would soon be out of danger 
and able to be moved to some quiet place to make a 
complete recovery. 

“Oh, I wish she could come here,” Harriet said, 
blurting aloud the thought that came to her on the 
instant. 

“There’s room on Thunderhead,” Granny said. 
“Even if this cabin’s plumb'up full as it is, we could 
tuck ’em in till we could get you^all your own place.” 

But nobody else echoed her welcome, and Harriet 



5 ° 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


flushed, remembering why her mother had left the 
mountain. Mother, they could not forget, was one 
of the hated Coomers. The Murrays could take in 
the Murray children — but would they take in 
Mother? Aunt Lissie’s silence must mean that she 
disapproved of the plan. Granny would do it— 
Granny was fine, full of understanding. But the oth' 
ers—Uncle Matt, Aunt Lissie, the aunts and uncles 
she had never seen, but of whom she had heard so 
often, those who lived here and there in the coves 
and hollows of Thunderhead Mountain. The Mur' 
ray clan—were they ready to take in Mother? 

Just after dinner she had overheard part of the 
conversation between Granny and Aunt Lissie which 
helped her to understand the present status of the 
old feud, on the mountain. 

“The young ’uns would let old bygones be, if the 
old ’uns would forget,” Granny had said. 

“If this here trouble hadn’t come along,” Aunt 
Lissie had added in sorrowful tones. 

As Harriet went upstairs to her room, she re' 
solved to have a quiet talk alone with Granny as 
soon as possible. Surely there must be some way to 
bring people in the same family together! 




Chapter V 


A NEW FRIEND AND A NEW JOB 

The next morning, after Dick and Bob had left 
for Slab Town to sell the huckleberries that had been 
left over from the jam, a man rode up to Granny 
Murray’s house and hitched his horse to the gate. 

“Howdy, everybody!” he called to Granny and 
Aunt Lissie and Harriet, and Nancy, who were sit' 
ting on the front porch. 

“Howdy, Squire,” returned Granny. “Come in and 
set a spell with us. What’s the news in No'End 
Hollow?” 

“No news to speak about, I reckon,” the Squire 


5i 









5 ! 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


replied. Then he took the chair that was offered, 
after the guests had been introduced. “And no ex¬ 
citement worth talkin’ about. Things have been real 
quiet ’round my place lately. Not much lawin’ for 
me to do. But I got me a job this momin’. I’m out 
to find a school teacher for the young ’uns. Been 
no school down our way since last winter, and the 
Board of Education can’t find anybody who has got 
enough sense to teach the school who will live this 
far from civilization. Don’t blame ’em much, though. 
The salary’s mighty little and the work real hard. 
Still, we got to have a teacher. We want to have a 
summer term.” 

When the Squire paused, Harriet asked a question 
which had come like a swift-winged bird to her: 

“What are the—educational requirements?” 

“Got to have a certificate is all I know,” was the 
answer. “The last school teacher at No-End was a 
right much of a scholar, but she didn’t take to No- 
End ways. She went back to town in a hurry. No- 
End school’s got to have a teacher, though. I prom¬ 
ised I’d try to find one.” 

“Harriet has taught school,” Nancy spoke up. 

“Just as a substitute teacher,” Harriet amended. 



A New Friend and a New Job 


53 


“But I would like to try. I’m eighteen and I’ve al¬ 
ways planned to be a teacher. Perhaps the Board 
would let me teach the school until they find a real 
teacher. I should love to do that, if they would be 
willing to try me.” 

“They’ll agree all right — they’ll be willing 
enough,” the Squire assured her heartily. “Have 
you got a certificate, Sissie?” 

“No, I haven’t,” Harriet honestly replied. “But 
they might not require a certificate of a substitute— 
they didn’t in our school where I taught quite a little 
last winter. I am ready for college, so I think I could 
manage the studies of the children unless some of 
them are very far advanced.” 

The Squire laughed. “There’s just twelve young 
’uns, and six can’t read or write their names — I 
reckon you’ll be able to teach ’em! Could you start 
Monday morning?” 

Eagerly Harriet assured him that she could. But 
just where was the school? Could she stay here at 
Granny’s and still be on hand every day in time? It 
was two miles down No-End Hollow, they told her, 
a “right smart ways,” as Granny declared, but at that 
no long stretch of walking. Harriet, all enthusiasm, 



54 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


made light of mere walking. Yes, she would go Mom 
day morning and open school. 

When the Squire was gone, Granny Murray 
chuckled. “I allowed as how Squire Caudil would 
do ye a good turn effen he could. He’s under obli- 
gations,” she added. 

Harriet looked at the old woman questioningly, 
but Granny only continued her chuckling, and it was 
Aunt Lissie who explained. 

“Last winter the moonshiners laid a plan to get rid 
o’ the Squire,” she told Harriet. “He stood fer too 
much law and order to suit the riffraff o’ the Hollow. 
Well, we Murrays have been about as rough as any¬ 
body, I reckon, but we don’t stand fer some things, 
and one is wildcat licker. There’s a good many oth¬ 
ers that feel like us, only they’re afraid o’ the moon¬ 
shiners; and our folks don’t know how to be afraid. 
So they sent word around to them moonshinin’ ras¬ 
cals last winter that if anything happened to the 
Squire there would be a settlement about it. And 
nothing ever did happen, and the Squire is still plumb 
healthy.” 

When Uncle Matt came in for dinner, he was de¬ 
lighted with the plan. “I declare, you’re all Murray,” 



A New Friend and a New Job 


55 


he said admiringly to Harriet. “Haven’t more’n got 
yerself settled in Far Beyant, than you’re the school 
teacher. I’m proud of you, girl.” 

Even Nancy was impressed. “Maybe I can come 
and help you some, Harriet,” she offered. 

Happier than she had been since they got off the 
train, Harriet beamed upon them all. 

When Dick and Bob returned, she burst upon 
them with the news. But although they too were 
impressed and delighted with her good fortune, it 
was evident that they were full of some news of their 
own. They said nothing during supper, however, of 
what was in their mind. Not until later when they 
had opportunity to beckon Harriet from the family 
circle and out onto the front porch did they enlighten 
her. 

“You know what I told you about that book,” 
Dick began in low tones, once the three of them were 
alone together. 

Harriet nodded. 

“Well, as soon as I told Bob about it this mom' 
ing, on the way over to Slab Town, he said we’d 
take a look at the place he’d thought of and see if 
it could have happened to Uncle Matt like the book 



56 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


said. Coming back, we got out of the wagon and 
experimented. It could have worked all right. 
Only—” 

“■—only it hasn’t helped us any about who it was 
that done it,” Bob finished. “So it’s not much good 
to us, as far as I can see.” 

“No,” Harriet agreed. “Of course it isn’t. You 
know I told you, Dick, not to—” 

“Wait a minute,” Dick interrupted. And digging 
into his pocket, he produced a piece of paper and a 
stubby pencil. 

“Now look—this is the road,” he explained, draw' 
ing a curving line. “And here’s where it passes 
through that steep, narrow cut in the mountain. 
Then here on the right is an overhanging rock. 
That’s where Bob and I figure the robber was lying 
when Uncle Matt came along with the mail and the 
money bag in the back of the wagon. If he knew the 
right bag, he could have hooked it up, all right.” 

“And it’s so rough and rocky along there that 
Pappy wouldn’t have noticed any noise,” Bob added. 

Harriet squinted at the sketch. “Y—y—yes,” she 
agreed, “I guess he could have done it, maybe. But 
how could anyone be quick enough?” 



A New Friend^ and a New Job 


57 


“It’s an awful hard pull for the horses along there,” 
Dick told her. “Uncle Matt was probably going 
pretty slow.” 

Again Harriet scrutinized the sketch. “It could 
have happened that way,” she said slowly. “But I 
think Bob is right. What good does it do to have 
figured this much out when you don’t know who 
did it?” 

Dick frowned. “You have to start somewhere. 
And thinking we know how it was done gives us 
something to look for. For somebody who has some 
extra money around here, for instance. Bob thinks 
so too, don’t you. Bob? At school, we’re going to 
talk with all the kids. We may find out something 
that way.” 

Harriet threw back her shoulders. “You boys are 
going to do something besides ask questions of the 
children and play detective,” she declared. “You’re 
going to study and you’re going to learn.” 

“We will, Harriet,” Bob promised. “We won’t 
be any trouble. But if we do get on the track of a 
clue, you’ll be glad, won’t you?” 

Harriet smiled. “Of course I’ll be glad. And I’d 
do anything in the world to help Uncle Matt.” 



58 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


There were more pupils than Harriet had counted 
on the next Monday morning. For besides the round 
dozen the Squire had promised, there were the five 
who went along with her from Granny Murray’s. 
Bob and Dick declared they were going especially to 
help the new teacher keep order. Nancy said she felt 
she should be on hand to keep Bob and Dick out of 
mischief. Then there were the twins who had a book 
apiece under their arms, and were planning to re' 
view short division. As for Harriet, she was glad to 
have the added number for their moral support. 

Just before they started off, Harriet took Dick 
and Bob aside. “You two will be careful, won’t 
you,” she said, “and not stir up any trouble making 
experiments to find out who took that money bag.” 

“Why, Harriet,” Dick protested, “we’re going as 
pupils. We’ll recite lessons just like all the rest—and 
you can make us mind you.” 

“And thrash us if we don’t behave,” Bob added, 
smiling at her. “That’s what Granny said at break' 
fast, remember? ‘Make them two boys behave, Har' 
riet.’ ” 

‘“And if they don’t, I’ll tend to them,’” said 
Dick, mimicking Uncle Matt. 



A New Friend^ and a New Job 


59 


“Pappy meant it, too,” Bob declared. “If you 
doubt it, get into some meanness and see what will 
happen to you—at least to me.” 

“I’ll share whatever comes along,” said Dick, grim 
ning cheerfully. 

After a happy walk, they came in sight of the 
schoolhouse, which lay across No'End Creek, in a 
little clearing among the pine trees. It was built of 
peeled pine logs, weathered until the color of the 
house was a shadowy gray'brown, and fitted into 
its surroundings like the big boulders up and down 
the creek. Already a group of children were stand' 
ing at the door, but when Harriet called a greeting to 
them, they were much too shy to speak. One or 
two of them did manage a smile, but the faces of the 
rest had little expression at all. Then Harriet caught 
sight of Mary Ann Coomer, leaning against a tree, 
apart from the rest, with a big stack of books in her 
arms. And with a light heart, the new teacher 
waved gaily and went into the small building. 

Inside, the schoolhouse was dusty and festooned 
with cobwebs and Harriet promptly decided that the 
morning would be spent in housecleaning. The chib 
dren took to the plan at once. Some gathered tree 



6o 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


branches for brooms, and swept down the walls and 
floor. Others carried water from the creek, using 
their dinner pails, the lunches having been placed on 
a big rock table outside, with a little girl left to keep 
guard. It wasn’t work at all, they decided, but a 
very fine sort of play. Very soon, the timid ones 
forgot to be shy, and with shouts of laughter, the 
new teacher’s first day of school was begun. 

In the midst of the hilarity, Mary Ann came up to 
Harriet. “I went back to get berries next day, but I 
didn’t see you,” she said. 

“No,” Harriet replied, “I’ve never been there 
again. The boys went back once, but I couldn’t go 
with them, and I’d have gotten lost if I’d gone alone. 
I’m glad you’ve come to school, Mary Ann.” 

“I’m glad, too. I had to stay home last term, on 
account of Mammy’s being sick. But I’ve been study' 
ing at home. Could I do the eighth grade, do you 
think? I can answer all the questions in geography 
clear up to Africa, and in history I’m on the War 
between the States. I’ve spelled clear through the 
speller twice—I did that last year. But it’s arithmetic 
that’s hard. I can’t understand square root.” 

Harriet laughed. “I had a hard time with square 




It wasn't wor\ at all, but a very fine sort of play 












































I 




*» 








A New Friend^ and a New Job 


63 


root myself, I remember, but if I haven’t forgotten 
the rules, I’ll do my best to help you, Mary Ann. 
Of course you may be in the eighth grade.” 

It did seem strange, she thought, to have this girl 
for a pupil—a girl who was quite as tall as she, and 
who must be as old, or older. But Mary Ann’s mind 
was on books now, and in her enthusiasm at the pros' 
pect of going to school again, she lost all trace of 
shyness. 

Mary Ann, Harriet discovered, was the only mem¬ 
ber of her family who had come to school that 
morning, though she had two sisters and brother who 
should be there. 

“Pappy didn’t much want to let me come,” Mary 
Ann admitted, “but Mammy said if I wanted to 
come, she didn’t have any objections now that she’s 
well again. I’m glad I saw you the other day,” she 
went on frankly, “because I liked you right away— 
even if you arc a Murray! That’s why Pappy don’t 
want the young ’uns here, and why Buck won’t 
come. You’re a Murray!” 

Harriet felt her cheeks bum, but Mary Ann was 
so frank and sincere that she couldn’t feel resentful. 

Impulsively she turned to this girl who might have 



6± 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


been her enemy but who had chosen to be her friend, 
and put her arms around her. 

“Oh, Mary Ann, let’s do be friends! Even if I am 
a Murray, even if you are a Coomer. I do think 
grudges are wicked, and silly, too. I am glad you are 
my cousin. It’s good to have folks who are kin to 
you, and if you and I are friendly, we can have a 
good time in spite of everything.’’ 

“I’m plumb willing,” said the other simply. “And 
I’ll take your part whatever comes up.” 













Chapter VI 
THE WARNING 


The splendid beginning of Harriet’s teaching con' 
tinued through the day. The pupils liked this new 
teacher of theirs who managed to keep them busy 
every minute. At dinnertime they gathered around 
the big rock table where the lunches were spread, 
and ate their meal together. Some of the children 
had found a patch of big, ripe blackberries which had 
grown in the shade and were extra sweet. These they 
served as a delicious dessert. 

During this pleasant outdoor meal Harriet made 
the discovery that most of her little school was made 
up of her kin—Murrays or Coomers. But regardless 
of whatever feud existed between the families, there 


65 




66 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


was no open hostility among the younger ones in 
school. 

For this Harriet was thankful. She had already 
realized that it was impossible to have regular classes 
until the children could get more books. But at least 
she could form reading, writing, and spelling groups. 
The pupils could help one another in this way by 
exchanging books. The more advanced and brighter 
ones could help the rest. That ought to encourage a 
friendlier feeling and lessen the old clannishness. She 
would teach them new songs, new games. All this 
would make for a better school spirit and change the 
community attitude later on. 

In the middle of the afternoon Harriet surprised 
them by announcing: “Put up your books for awhile. 
We are going to have some fun. Do you know 
The Farmer in the Dell? It’s a singing game.” 

No, they had never heard of it. 

Once outside, the children rushed to form a ring 
under Harriet’s direction. Soon they were all chant- 
ing with great delight the old folk song: 

“The farmer in the dell, 

The farmer in the dell, 

Heigh-o! the derry oh, 

The farmer in the dell.” 



The Warning 


67 

In the grand mixup of this merry game Murrays 
and Coomers swung together and danced with one 
another in a breathless, laughing whirl. 

Before they went home, Harriet said to Mary Ann, 
“Try to get your brother and sisters to come. I be¬ 
lieve they would like school this year. Tell them 
what a good time we all had today.” 

“I will do that,” Mary Ann promised. “But you 
needn’t want Buck to come. He’s no hand at book 
leamin’, and besides he’s too no-account to get an 
education.” It was plain to be seen that Mary Ann 
was outspoken in her judgment and severe toward 
those less ambitious than herself. 

Harriet smiled at her. “Let’s give Buck a chance 
anyway,” she said. “Is he older than you?” 

Mary Ann nodded. “Older and like Pappy—ter¬ 
ribly set.” 

That night when Harriet and her five came troop¬ 
ing back, they interrupted Uncle Matt in the midst 
of a dramatic account of some trouble in the No-End 
mines. And so absorbed were Granny and Aunt 
Lissie that even the new schoolteacher’s story of her 
first day must wait for him to finish. 

“I went over to the foreman like I said I was goin’ 



68 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


to,” Uncle Matt explained, beginning again for the 
benefit of the newcomers, “and he said he didn’t care 
if there were some folks sayin’ I’d stolen that mine 
money so that I can’t get my mail job back until the 
case comes up in court and it’s proved I didn’t do it. 
He’d take me in there at the mine, he said. And I 
could start right then and there, so I did. 

“But I hadn’t got very far with it before I began 
to find out what’s happenin’ there. That man from 
foreign parts is still around, stirrin’ everybody up to 
strike for bigger wages. He says it isn’t true that the 
company’s carryin’ a heavy load and that they’re 
payin’ as good wages as they can. Some of the men 
believe him and some of them don’t and there’s a 
lot of talk and it’s not all pleasant, either.” 

“Do you believe him. Pappy?” Bob asked. 

Uncle Matt shook his head. 

“Before the mines were opened, real money was 
about as sca’ce as hen’s teeth on this side o’ Thunder' 
head Mountain,” commented Granny. 

“Yes, and the foreman’s worked mighty hard to 
keep things going during these hard times,” added 
Aunt Lissie. “Once things get to going right again, 
they’ll do better on the pay.” 



The Warning 


69 


“That man who calls himself Jones—he’s the one 
from foreign parts—he has lots o’ strange notions. 
He’s the one that took to ridin’ back and forth to 
Slab Town with me just before the mail money got 
taken. He always was asking me questions about 
what was in the bags and a lot else that was none 
of his business. Never did like his looks.” 

Just then Bob caught sight of two figures passing 
around the bend of the trail that climbed the moun¬ 
tain and crossed No-End Creek below the house. 
“Look, Pappy!” called Bob excitedly. “Ain’t that 
him now?” 

Uncle Matt looked in the direction of Bob’s point¬ 
ing finger. “Yep, that’s him. Funny how he hap¬ 
pened along right now while I was tellin’ ye about 
him.” 

“Who is that with him?” asked Harriet. 

Uncle Matt smiled wryly as he replied, “Why, 
that’s some more o’ yer kinfolks, honey. That’s your 
mammy’s cousin, Mary Ann Coomer’s pappy.” 

“Tell us about your teachin’, child,” Granny said 
quickly. “Did these boys behave like I told them to?” 

Not until after supper was the story finished. 

“I declare, I’m that proud I’d like to start out right 



21 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


now and tell every livin’ soul on Thunderhead Moun¬ 
tain the kind of grandchild I’ve got,” Granny de¬ 
clared when at last no one had any more questions 
to ask. 

“You did right smart well, child,” Uncle Matt 
agreed. “But don’t you go countin’ on things being 
nice and quiet right along. There’s too much trouble 
in these parts for you not to get some of it.” 

At his words, memory of Uncle Matt’s own great 
trouble swept over them all. For a time, in the hap¬ 
piness of his new position in the mine and in Har¬ 
riet’s successful first teaching day, they had forgot¬ 
ten. Now the thought of the accusation against him 
seemed to leap out from the gathering darkness. To 
leap out, and to menace them. 

When, later, Harriet went up to bed, she tossed 
restlessly about. Poor Uncle Matt! As she finally 
drifted off to sleep, the sadness and tragedy of the 
false accusation was still her burden. Even the next 
morning when she awoke, she could not shak p off 
her dread of what lay ahead. 

On her way to school, Harriet realized that there 
was relief in a task to be done, and in the fact that 
she had definite plans. 



The Warning 


7i 


Her second day of school, like the first went off 
well. The children liked sitting together in friendly, 
informal groups. The pupils who had books shared 
them with those who had none. The ones who 
learned their lessons first helped the plodders. Here 
and there a Murray and a Coomer were seen holding 
the same book. 

Cooperation in everything instead of competition 
—that must be the spirit of her school. Harriet 
knew this with that intuition bom in the hearts of 
all true teachers. 

At recess she taught the children another singing 
game— Oats, Peas, Beans, and Barley Grow . How they 
liked the dramatic motions they made with their 
feet and hands as they sang: 

“Thus the farmer sows his seed, 

Thus he stands and takes his ease, 

Stamps his foot and claps his hands, 

And turns around to view his lands.” 

Work and play, play and work—if these children’s 
bodies and minds were kept busy along natural and 
wholesome ways—it would go far to solve the big 
problem. 

But on the third day Harriet felt from the start a 
spirit of unrest in her little school. It was not any- 



2! 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


thing that she could put her finger on, but some- 
thing of which she was all too keenly aware. What 
was it? 

That afternoon, when the children started home 
there was a division in the crowd. Harriet, walking 
along with Mary Ann, noticed that some lagged be¬ 
hind while others walked quite a distance ahead. 
She and Mary Ann kept the middle pace, though 
without intention. 

Watching them closely, Harriet had a sudden 
thought. Yes, the crowd was divided on purpose. 
Else why were the Murray children all in front, and 
the Coomers lagging behind? She glanced quickly at 
Mary Ann who had been rather silent all day, and 
had hardly spoken on the road. Her face wore a 
troubled look. 

“Mary Ann, what is the matter?” 

At the sudden question the girl’s face flushed, and 
her eyes dropped. Harriet could read no answer in 
them. 

“Is it anything I have done, Mary Ann? Please 
tell me!” 

Mary Ann slowly shook her head, but did not 
speak. 



The Warning 


73 


Harriet felt helpless, confronted as she was with 
this unexpected barrier which had risen so suddenly 
between them. Then impulsively she reached out 
and took her cousin’s hand, clasping it tightly. 

At this Mary Ann turned her face away, and Har- 
riet heard a muffled sound. Mary Ann was crying. 

Harriet looked about in dismay. If only they were 
alone! 

In a moment, Mary Ann swallowed hard and 
turning, looked straight through her tears into Har¬ 
riet’s eyes. 

“Harriet, I want you to give up the school—to 
leave this mountain right away.” 

Her words came with a sudden rush, as if the 
strength of a flood had with mighty surge and des¬ 
perate strength swept away its barriers. 

Harriet thrust her arm through her cousin’s and 
drew her close. “What do you mean, Mary Ann? 
You’ve got to tell me the trouble. I’ve known all 
day that something was wrong, but I couldn’t under¬ 
stand what it was or why. Is it something I’ve done 
or said in school?” 

Mary Ann squared her shoulders. “No, it isn’t 
that,” she declared. “But everybody in school has 



74 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


been hearing things at home. There’s sure to be open 
trouble soon. Part of it’s over the miners’ money 
that was stolen from the wagon. My father says a 
lot of folks think your Uncle Matt took it to spite 
the men who are striking for higher wages. And it 
does look mighty strange that the company turned 
around and gave your uncle a good job after he lost 
the money for them. Pappy says that Jones says it 
was all a put-up job, and that your Uncle Matt and 
the mine owners worked it out just to throw sus¬ 
picion onto the men that some of them stole it.” 

Harriet stopped abruptly. “It is not true—it’s 
not!” she cried. “Uncle Matt is not that kind of per¬ 
son. He wouldn’t, he couldn’t do a thing as mean, as 
wicked a thing as that! Uncle Matt is a good man. 
And the reason he got the new job with the com¬ 
pany is because they believe in his honesty even if 
appearances are against him.” 

“I don’t know anything about it,” said Mary Ann 
in a tone that seemed to say she did not wish to hurt 
Harriet, but was herself not entirely convinced. 

They were now at the parting of the ways, and 
Harriet turned to Mary Ann with a determined effort 
to part in the same friendly manner as always. “Good- 



The Warning 


75 


bye,” she said, “Remember—we are friends, Mary 
Ann.” 

“Good-bye,” said Mary Ann, turning away abrupt¬ 
ly to run down the trail that soon lost itself in 
the trees. 

















Chapter VII 

GOOD NEWS AND BAD NEWS 


When Harriet reached home, she found a letter 
awaiting her with good news. Father wrote to say 
that Mother was so much better she could leave the 
sanatorium before long. 

“We have talked plans over,” ran the letter, “and 
have decided on one thing, to come to Far Beyant 
again for a little while, if we can find a place on that 
side of Thunderhead Mountain. Maybe there’s an 
empty cabin somewhere. It won’t need much fur¬ 
nishing, for Mother stays outdoors nearly all the 
time. She wants to come back to the mountain, and 


7 6 




Good News and Bad News 


77 


I do, too. And we want to see our kinfolks again, 
including half a dozen of our nearest and dearest. 
Write us if there’s a place around there where we 
can tuck ourselves in.” 

Harriet read it aloud. At the end her voice quiv¬ 
ered a little, her heart was so full of the ache to have 
her family all together again. The cold fear that had 
clutched her after Mary Ann’s departure loosened its 
icy fingers, and relief surged upward in a joyful tide 
of tears that could not be restrained. 

The twins looked at her curiously. 

“I don’t see anything to cry about,” John de¬ 
clared, with Joan echoing him. “I’m going to yell,” 
he said. And he did, promptly joined by his twin. 

“Hurrah! We’re going to have Father and Mother 
again!” 

They made such a fuss that they were sent outside 
to rejoice together, and Billy Boy followed to add a 
few whoops. Granny didn’t mind. She was, she de¬ 
clared, might-nigh as excited as the children, and felt 
like praising the Lord right out as if it were Big 
Meeting. 

“It’ll be a sight for sore eyes,” she said. “I had 
plumb given up seeing my family united again this 



78 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


side o’ the Kingdom.” And Harriet was happy to 
see, by the expression in her eyes, that Aunt Lissie 
felt the same. 

“We’ve got to find a place,” reminded Dick. 
“We’ve got to find an empty cabin somewhere, or 
they won’t come. There’s got to be room for ’em.” 

“Is there a place?” Harriet asked. 

“There’s Orchard Hill Cabin,” suggested Aunt 
Lissie. “Squire Caudil owns that, but it’s had no' 
body in it since—” she stopped short. 

“Yes, I know,” Granny Murray nodded. “But 
that was a long time ago, and I reckon the place ain’t 
ha’nted by anything worse than ghostly smells.” 

“Ghostly smells!” Nancy shuddered. “What do 
you mean, Granny, anyway?” 

“Foolishness, mostly,” chuckled Granny, her 
brown face crinkling into a smile. “You’d better not 
get me started into tellin’ all I know about that old 
place or we won’t go ahead plannin’ what’s to do and 
how it’s to be done. It’s the last chance, I’m thinkin’ 
—that cabin on Orchard Hill. We’d better see 
Squire tomorrow and if he’ll let us have it we’ll 
start work right away to make it fitten to live in.” 

“We must find some furniture, too,” murmured 



Good News and Bad News 


79 


Harriet, thinking aloud. At the end of the month 
she would have her money for teaching, and then 
she could do things. Oh, it would be fun to get a 
little home ready for her dear ones. 

Now Aunt Lissie spoke up with never a word 
about Mother’s being a Coomer. “There’s a bed' 
stead up in the garret, an old founposter. I’ll make 
a straw tick.” 

Uncle Matt came in and interrupted their happy 
planning with a bit of bad news he had gathered that 
day. 

“That fellow Jones,” he told them, “is a prime 
troublemaker, I guess. He’s going up and down the 
mountain putting crazy notions into everybody’s 
head. He’s got the whole Coomer tribe with him, 
and others, too, I am sorry to say. Whenever I try 
to reason with them they think I am on the Com' 
pany’s side. And I am, in a way,” he added, “but 
that’s because I can’t see but one side. We’ve always 
stood together—the Company and the Company’s 
men. They’ve always paid us good wages for good 
work. The Company has stood by the miners in 
good times and bad ones, too, not like the com' 
panies I’ve heard tell of other places. It’s been bad 



8o 


The Mail Wagon Mystery. 


times of late, too—and now this fellow, Jones, an 
outlander from the Lord knows where, comes in and 
stirs up trouble.” 

“The Coomers are always ready fer that, even in 
school,” Bob muttered. 

Again Harriet felt the dark wings of fear flapping 
ominously above her. Not in school! Let the feud 
be fought outside, but not in school, where they 
were all friends together! Then she thought of Mary 
Ann’s words. Was Mary Ann’s warning true? Oh, 
it couldn’t be. 

“If they want to fight,” Bob was saying, “we’ll 
fight ’em fair. But we’ll fight, I guess.” 

“I’m with you!” Dick said to his cousin, and arm 
in arm they turned to the door. 

But Granny had overhead them. Getting up from 
her rocker, she rapped on the floor with the knobby 
walking stick that she carried on the days when the 
rheumatism bothered her old legs. 

“Come back here, you boys, and listen to me. And 
mind you pay me good attention. Don’t you start 
a fire you can’t put out. I’ve seen a good many fires 
started, and fought some, too! Be careful what you 
do, and careful what you say. The Coomers may 



Good News and Bad News 


81 


pile the wood but it won’t blaze unless somebody 
sticks a match to it.” 

“I don’t mean to start anything,” muttered Bob. 

That was his answer to Granny, but Harriet knew 
that his real reply was as yet unspoken. 

Dick said nothing. His steady eyes would not 
meet the long look she gave him, and their gaze 
reached out the cabin door to the shadows on Thun' 
derhead Mountain. 

Aunt Lissie got up to see about preparations for 
supper. 

“You want to look in the comer cupboard, Harriet, 
and find a jar of huckleberry jam? I think I’ll make 
fresh biscuit tonight.” 

“Yes," Harriet answered, thankful to have some' 
thing to do just then. It seemed to break the spell 
that had come down like a raincloud, dimming the 
sunshine of joy and hope and expectation in her 
heart. She mustn’t be afraid. Clouds passed. If only 
this one could disappear from the mountain before 
Father and Mother came back to their old home. 

She would get ready for them, anyway. She would 
see Squire Caudil tomorrow about that empty cabin 
on Orchard Hill. What a pretty name for a home 




82 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


place! After they all got busy with plans and prep* 
arations there, it would leave less time to think of 
feud fights and other troubles. And it might keep 
Dick out of trouble—Bob, too. Yes, she would see 
about that cabin next day. 










Chapter VIII 

SOMETHING TURNS UP 

Neither Bob nor Dick was in sight when it was 
time to start to school next morning. They had 
eaten their breakfast quickly, then disappeared. No¬ 
body had seen in what direction they had gone, not 
even the twins who rarely missed any comings or 
goings around them. 

Harriet did not speak her fear that the two had 
slipped away on some foolish adventure, but remem¬ 
bering Bob’s threat of the night before, she was 
deeply worried. 

“Perhaps they have raced ahead to school. Let’s 
83 


84 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


hurry on and catch them,” she said to the other 
children, speaking lightly against the fear. 

The trail that curled down the Hollow had never 
seemed so long to her. At length around the last 
curve, they came in sight of the schoolhouse. A 
small group, half the usual size, had gathered in front 
of the door. No sight of Dick or Bob. Thrusting 
her worry aside, Harriet smiled at the children and 
said, “Good morning,” cheerfully. A few replies 
were given her, a few shy smiles as she went into the 
schoolhouse and put up her things. 

“Can we have a game?” somebody asked. 

“Yes,” Harriet exclaimed in relief. “Well play 
until time for classes.” 

“Let’s play Midnight!” 

“Going Up to London!” 

“Miley Bright!” 

“The Jolly Miller!” 

They shouted their favorite games, running out 
into the little clearing in the pine thicket where they 
played. It was a pleasant morning with the sunshine 
sending long yellow fingers through the shadowy tops 
of the pines, and the dew'damp air laden with a ferny 
fragrance and the odor of resin. It was much too 



Something Turin Up 


85 


bright and beautiful a world to drag down into en¬ 
mities, Harriet thought, as the children made a circle 
around her and chose her to be “It”. The children 
sang gaily: 

“Go round and round the village. 

Go round and round the village, 

Go round and round the village, 

As we have done before!” 

Harriet chose her partner when the time came, 
then sang the words of the old ditty over and over. 
But inside her mind a different refrain repeated itself 
in a tuneless wail: 

“Where is Dick — where is Bob? 

I wonder what they are doing!” 

As the last words of the song died away, Harriet 
glanced at the watch Uncle Matt had lent her—a 
watch as big and fat as a piece of Aunt Lissie’s biscuit 
bread—but a good reliable timekeeper which Harriet 
appreciated using. Grandfather Murray’s watch, it 
had been. 

“I don’t need two timepieces to keep me on the 
go,” Uncle Matt had said in presenting her with this 
one. “Got this other one here, trading.” 

Harriet smiled at the memory. Uncle Matt was 
so much like Father, always finding a good excuse 



The Mail Wagon Mystery. 


for doing a good turn! She had never written Father 
a word of Uncle Matt’s trouble. No need for him to 
know about it yet. Still she hated to have him come 
back to his kin after all these years and find such 
news waiting for him. 

Harriet sighed, then caught sight of Nancy’s face 
turned toward her, and Nancy’s keen eyes reading 
hers. She nodded gaily at her sister, then called, 
“That’s all for this time, children. We’ll go in now. 
Yes, you may ring the bell, Andy,” she said to a 
small Coomer cousin who nudged her hopefully. 

As the little group marched in, Nancy lingered at 
the end of the line. 

“Don’t worry, Harriet, about Bob and Dick,” she 
whispered. “I don’t know where they’ve gone, but 
from what I happened to overhear them talking 
about this morning I reckon they must have gone to 
Slab Town on business of their own.” 

“Why didn’t you tell me before?” Harriet asked, 
looking closely at her sister. 

“I—I hated to let on that I listened in,” Nancy 
stammered, “and I didn’t, only for half a minute.” 

“Well!” It was a sigh of relief. If those two boys 
had gone to Slab Town they couldn’t be into any 



Something^ Turns Up 


87 


trouble with the Coomers, for the Coomers lived on 
the other side of Thunderhead. Even so, they 
shouldn’t have gone away without permission from 
Uncle Matt or from Granny Murray. Well, this 
was another problem, but one that would have to 
wait awhile. 

The morning passed—somehow. Harriet heard 
lessons—A B C’s, spelling lessons, and arithmetic. 
That took her to recess. After she had dismissed the 
room, she turned to see Mary Ann Coomer standing 
on the other side of the table that served for a teach' 
er’s desk. She had been late that morning, had missed 
two lessons, and this was Harriet’s first chance to 
have a word with her. 

But it was Mary Ann who spoke first. No howdy 
or shy good morning prefaced what she had to say 
now. It came out with a rush of pent'up feeling: 

“I can’t come to school tomorrow!” A flood of 
tears followed this thunderclap. The girl’s thin shoub 
ders were shaking. 

“Sit down; sit down here, Mary Ann,” said Har- 
riet comfortingly, walking around the table and lead' 
ing the girl back to her own chair. 

“Now, Mary Ann, tell me all about it. What’s 



The Mail Wagon Mystery 


happened—what’s the matter that you are obliged 
to stop school?” 

Mary Ann drew a long breath and wiped her eyes 
on the comer of her blue-checked apron. In the tense 
silence Nancy’s face poked in at the door. 

“Coming, Harriet?” she began, then her face so- 
bered, and she drew the door shut behind her as she 
slipped away. 

Nancy had a rare gift, Harriet thought, the gift 
of understanding a trying situation without having 
to have it explained to her. 

“Tell me, Mary Ann,” said Harriet, softly. 

“I don’t want to stop—I don’t want to stop—but 
I can’t persuade Pappy—and Mammy can’t persuade 
him—to let me come on. He’s off on a tear, I reckon, 
just because you are teaching the school—just be¬ 
cause you’re a Murray!” 

“But that is a foolish reason,” Harriet said, wrin¬ 
kling her forehead. “I can’t help being a Murray, 
and what in the world does he have against me? 
Doesn’t he know I am friendly to all my Coomer 
kin? Am I not a Coomer just as much as I’m a Mur¬ 
ray?” she asked. 

Mary Ann wiped her eyes on her apron with a vig- 














V.UC./A PATTO Nj ^-.t. 


WivcV. 


"Tell me, Mary Ann,” said Harriet, softly 






















































Something Turns Up 


9 i 


orous gesture as if she were done with anything so 
futile as crying, and swallowed her sobs determinedly. 

“I’ll tell you the truth,” she stated. “That’s not 
the whole of it. Pappy is mad because he thinks your 
Uncle Matt is playing in with the Company and sid- 
ing against the miners that want bigger wages. That’s 
the root of the whole thing.” 

“He never—he isn’t!” cried Harriet. “Uncle Matt 
never did. He wouldn’t do such a thing. But even 
—even if he had—what have I to do with it? Does 
your father think that I helped steal the money? No, 
he couldn’t. It disappeared before I ever came to the 
mountain. He couldn’t possibly—” 

“He doesn’t, of course not,” Mary Ann shook her 
head. “It is just that you’re one of ’em,” she nodded 
again. “It’s just that you’re a Murray.” 

“I can’t understand that at all,” Harriet told her 
cousin. “Why, it doesn’t make sense!” 

Mary Ann agreed. “No, it doesn’t. And Mammy 
says there’s no sense to a feud. Mammy doesn’t hold 
with Pappy. She wants the old feud to die out— 
and I feel like Mammy. Besides, I think she’s talked 
my brother, Buck, into feeling the same too.” 

As Harriet stood beside Mary Ann, it seemed to 



92 


The Matt Wagon Mystery 


her as though a hand had lighted a candle in the 
comer of a dark room. Clearly and distinctly, she 
knew that the womenfolk on this mountain hated 
the feud. They wanted it to die. 

The Murray and the Coomer women saw alike, 
felt alike. Aunt Lissie had proven as glad as Granny 
that Mother was coming back, now that she was 
acquainted with the Murray Six. It was just because 
she was shy that she hadn’t spoken up about Moth' 
er’s coming right at first. If only the women could 
be given the right'of'way for one time. Only one 
big chance would be needed if the womenfolk could 
have it; have it all at once—and have it together. 
They would show their men folk then! 

Mary Ann got up and, going to her desk, began 
to get her books together. “I might as well go home 
now,” she said. “If I stay here I’ll keep on crying, 
and I don’t want the others to see me do that. I’ll 
slip out while they are playing.” 

She tucked her worn books under her arm and 
started away. Harriet followed. 

“Good'bye, Mary Ann,” she said at the door. It 
was all she could manage just then. 

Mary Ann did not reply, but she turned on the 



Something^ Turns Up 


93 

trail, looked back and waved once. Then she passed 
out of sight. But not from her cousin’s inner vision. 
All through the rest of the day, Harriet saw before 
her that pathetic figure, heard the longing words, 
“I don’t want to stop.” 

When the children got home from school that 
afternoon, they found Bob and Dick at the woodpile, 
but the boys weren’t sawing or cutting wood. They 
were sitting on a log, with Uncle Matt between them, 
engaged in earnest conversation. 

“They’re up to something, I think,” Granny said. 
“I don’t know where they’ve been—they didn’t say 
when they turned up, but Uncle Matt’s a-hold of 
’em. He’ll unravel any trick they’ve tried, if he finds 
the loose end of the string.” 

The women set about the evening meal. The com 
pone was baking and the bean pot on the crane was 
boiling and bubbling away when Uncle Matt and 
the boys came in. 

The twins were ready for them. Only by strict 
command had they been kept away from investiga' 
tions of their own into that meeting at the woodpile. 

“You ran away from school today!” John accused 
his brother. 



9£ 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


“And you did, too!” Joan said, pointing a finger at 
her Cousin Bob. 

The boys grinned and looked at Uncle Matt. 

“Did you get ’panked?” asked Billy Boy, who was 
old enough to understand one or two logical things. 

Dick laughed and picked his small brother up. 

“So you think we’ve been bad boys, do you? Bob, 
I reckon we might as well tell ’em what we’ve been 
up to or they’ll imagine the worst.” 

“Reckon so,” said Bob, “but we’ve not got much 
to tell ’em, so far.” 

“Sounds mysterious,” Nancy put in. “I knew it 
was an adventure when I heard—” She stopped, but 
too late. 

“You heard? You were snooping around!” Dick 
accused her. “Some folks have a mind to other peo- 
pie’s business. Just for that, we won’t tell you. You 
can chase along. Missy, I guess, while we tell the oth¬ 
ers what we found out today.” 

Nancy looked so disappointed and woebegone that 
Harriet put in a good word for her. 

“She didn’t mean to eavesdrop on your scheme, 
Dick. And she didn’t, anyway. All that she knows 
is that you went to Slab Town.” 



Something Turns Up 


95 


“Humph—then she doesn’t know!” crowed Dick. 
“Well, we didn’t go to Slab Town—we found what 
we found, about halfway there.” 

“We did that,” Bob nodded. 

Harriet glanced at Uncle Matt. His grave face was 
a study. 

“Beats all I ever heard,” he said, speaking in a 
puzzled manner, as if he were dazed by what had 
been revealed to him. 

Granny rapped the floor for attention. 

“Speak up. Go on with your tale, one of you. 
It’s enough to get a body all flustered the way you 
hint around and about.” 

And Dick went ahead with the story. 






DICK’S STORY 

“We’ve found out the way that mail bag money 
disappeared,” Dick told them, with a triumphant 
look at Harriet. 

“And the money?” Harriet cried. 

“No, we didn’t find the money,” he said, “but 
we’re on the track of it anyway, aren’t we. Bob?” 

The other boy nodded. “I reckon we are—seems 
like it, sort of.” 

“I believe you’re right,” Uncle Matt said, “or 
might'nigh right anyway. Show ’em what you 
showed me, boys. Bring it in and pass it around.” 

96 



Dice’s Story 


97 


Bob hurried from the room, and Nancy broke the 
tense silence that followed his departure. “What 
comes next? It’s just like a play when you can hardly 
wait for another act.” 

“I thought that it was going to be a story,” com' 
plained Joan, “and I don’t know when it began, be' 
cause nobody tells it.” 

“Aw, wait,” John counselled her. “You’re in too 
big a hurry.” 

“Don’t expect too much of a story, any of you,” 
Dick told them. “We don’t know the real beginning 
—and we don’t know the end. If this were a chap' 
ter in a book, it would come about the middle. Don’t 
expect too much now,” he cautioned them again. 

Bob came back carrying a long stick thrust out 
before him. 

“Walking stick!” cried Billy Boy, and indeed it 
might have been a walking stick belonging to a giant, 
this long, slim sapling stick, whittled to a hook at 
one end. 

“We found this poked up a hollow tree last Satup 
day,” Dick explained, “when Bob’s dog ran some ani' 
mal into its hole at the foot. He stayed there and 
barked till we went to find him, and we found this 



The Mail Wagon Mystery 


hooked up inside the tree. Bob said it might be a bee 
tree that somebody had found and the stick was a 
marker to prove he’d found it first in case someone 
else came along.” 

“But it wasn’t,” Bob interrupted. “We sensed that 
as soon as we looked around. For there wasn’t a sign 
of any bees in that tree.” 

“No, there wasn’t,” said Dick. “Well, we realised 
we were almost above that pass where Uncle Matt 
lost the money—or I mean where he could have— 
and it was all such a lot like the book that we decided 
to hide the stick and go back later and wait for the 
mail wagon and try hooking up one of the mail bags. 
That’s what the bandits did in my book, Granny. 

“We didn’t go to school this morning because we 
had to be there at the pass when Allen Thome came 
along with the mail wagon. We got the stick and 
stood on the ledge that sticks out like a roof. When 
the wagon came through the pass, Bob reached away 
down and hooked one of his mail sacks and swung 
it up clear of the wagon. Allen was up in front and 
didn’t look up or even hear us till we gave a 
whoop—” 

“And nearly scared him to death!” 



Dice’s Story 


99 

Bob laughed. “I’ll always remember Allen’s face. 
He thought mail robbers had nabbed him for certain 
that time. We didn’t tell him why we did the hook' 
in’. He thought it was just a joke. And we didn’t 
say anything about what we figured the hook had 
been made for in the first place, either.” 

“Well,” Dick went on, “after Allen rode on, still 
laughing like anything, we decided to talk it all over 
with Uncle Matt.” 

“And I said I didn’t blame you a bit, Harriet, ror 
telling the boys in the first place that it was just a 
foolish notion from a book and not much use to me 
in my trouble,” interrupted Uncle Matt, turning to 
Harriet. 

“And we didn’t tell you about the hook because 
we wanted to see what Uncle Matt thought,” Bob 
added. 

“And I say you haven’t really proved anything 
yet, son,” said Uncle Matt, kindly. “Not really. Even 
though the stick probably was the way of it.” 

“Anyway,” Dick declared then, “you said you’d 
like to try it out for yourself. And you went along 
to show us the place where you let the horses rest.” 

Dick turned to the rest of the family. “And we 



100 


The MaU Wagon Mystery 


got up above with the hook and the thief could have 
worked his trick just like we thought. He could— 
we decided on that much.” And again he looked at 
Harriet triumphantly. 

“Yes, he could,” Uncle Matt agreed again, speak' 
ing slowly. “He could. But where is the money now? 
A tale like this won’t clear me in the court. It won’t 
prove anything to the judge’s notion. I wish I could 
think of something to do next—some place to look 
for the money.” 

No word was spoken in the room for a long min' 
ute. Then Aunt Lissie rose and lifted the bean kettle 
off the fire. 

And Granny got up, and stretching herself, said, 
“I’m thinking Dick’s right, howsomever. This tale 
ain’t done. And this day ain’t tomorrow. There’s 
time for a lot o’ things to turn up afore we come to 
the end of it all. That’s what I think. And may the 
Lord above bless us!” 

After supper Harriet sat in the narrow passageway 
between the two parts of the cabin, called the dog' 
trot, to catch the last light of the day while she 
wrote a letter to her parents. Careful not to say any' 
thing that would betray her worried and anxious 



Dice’s Story 


IOI 


feelings about Uncle Matt, she mentioned nothing 
but the plan for their visit and the day to day doings 
of the family. 

“I’m going to see about a home^place tomorrow,” 
she said at the end. “I’ll write all about it in my 
next letter.” 

After she had gone to bed, she lay awake, staring 
up into the darkness. It seemed a long time since the 
evening when they received that letter from their 
mountain kin. To the Murray Six, the letter had 
seemed a ticket to what they had thought would be 
such a happy adventure, but which had plunged 
them into such difficulties—Uncle Matt’s trouble and 
the unfriendliness which might grow so strong that 
the school would be broken up. Harriet sighed heav' 
ily. Couldn’t something be done to solve the prob' 
lems, something that would bring back happy days 
here on the mountain? Something that would solve 
the mystery of the vanished money? 

Out of the dark a hand now reached across her 
pillow and rested with a comforting touch on her 
head. “Don’t take too much worriment to bed with 
you, honey,” whispered Granny from out the shad' 
ows through which she had so quietly crept. “You 



102 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


must ease your load sometimes if you expect to carry 
it safely. I’ve toted a good many loads, times past, 
and some of them heavier than this, too. But there’s 
always a way out. Morning helps in the showing of 
what to do. Don’t take your troubles to bed.” 

Gratefully, Harriet took Granny’s hand in her 
own. “Oh, Granny,” she said with a catch in her 
voice, “I’m afraid our coming has only added to your 
burden. And I hate to think that.” 

“Then don’t,” replied Granny. “Besides, it’s not 
so. The money gettin’ stolen was none of your do¬ 
ings. The way the Murrays and the Coomers set to 
ain’t no fault of yours, either. And what else is 
there? The trouble at the mine, to be sure. But 
that’s the work of that Jones. Do you see, honey?” 

Harriet pressed her hand tightly, but did not speak. 

“And look at what good your coming’s done us, 
child. I’m glad—we’re all glad to have the passel o’ 
you with us. It gives Matt and Lissie something to 
think about besides their puzzlement over that 
money. And Bob has somebody to trek along with 
him. I don’t guess he’d have gone to school at all 
if it hadn’t been for you and Dick. Do you see, 
honey? 



Dice’s Story 


“l 

“And now your mammy and your pappy are com' 
in’, and that’s good, too. Likely their gettin’ here’ll 
help all the kin. For the kin’ll be so downright curi' 
ous to take a look at folks who went off to live in 
foreign parts, they’ll come troopin’ up, Coomers or 
no. And with your mammy and your pappy with 
us, there’ll be that many more of us together to see 
things through. Yes, we’ll all be together, no matter 
what may come. And when folks stand side by side 
and share the carryin’ of their load, it’s a lot lighter.” 

“Yes,” agreed Harriet. And magically the bother' 
some problems did seem lighter, much lighter. Per¬ 
haps something really could be done about them. 

Quietly then, with a last firm pressure of her grand' 
daughter’s hand. Granny slipped away. A cricket 
chirped from a crack in the log chinking. A whip' 
poorwill called from down the hollow. And Harriet 
was asleep. 





Chapter X 

THE HOUSE ON ORCHARD HILL 


It was Harriet who got the first glimpse of Squire 
Caudil’s cabin. All she could see was just a patch of 
gray roof partially hidden by the hovering boughs 
of gnarled old apple trees. The orchard sprawled over 
the hillside and crept right up to the cabin, which 
seemed all the more cozy because of the encircling 
trees. 

“Look! Is that—? Oh, it must be the place!” she 
cried, turning to the others coming behind her on 
the trail—Squire Caudil, Bob, Dick, Nancy, and the 
twins. Billy Boy had wailed and wept to come, and 


104 


The House on Orchard Hill 


105 

had been consoled only when they promised to bring 
back ripe apples if they found any. 

“Yep—that’s the place,’’ Squire Caudil said. 

“What a lovely view!” exclaimed Nancy. “Why, 
it is just like a picture!” 

Squire chuckled. “Yes, a right pretty view from 
here,” he agreed. “A little closer up you might see 
the loose chinking and holes in the roof plenty big 
enough for a cat to jump through.” 

“We can live out under the trees till we fix up the 
house. Camp out. It would be fun,” said Nancy, 
who had showed more interest in this new plan than 
in anything they had done since leaving their old 
home. 

“Oh, oh! That would be like a picnic!” shouted 
Joan joyfully, dancing up and down. 

“Picnic nothing,” her twin brother told her. 
“You’ve got to help with the work, hasn’t she, 
Dick?” 

“We’ll have a big job soon, all right, I guess,” 
Dick replied. 

Reaching the door of the cabin, they looked curb 
ously inside. What they saw was not encouraging. 
Leaves strewed the floor. Spider webs curtained the 



io6 


The Matt Wagon Mystery^ 


windows which were only shuttered holes in the 
wall. And as the crowd trooped through the door, 
some small inhabitant scurried away from the leaves 
banked high in a far comer and made his departure. 

“Maybe it’s a snake,” Nancy cried, backing herself 
out in a hurry. 

“No,” replied Squire, “just a mouse, I guess, or 
maybe a ground squirrel. Come back, Nancy, I’ll 
take care of you.” 

Then he stamped on the floor. “Yes, the sleepers 
are sound—a good foundation, and that’s something. 
This is the old kitchen,” he told them. “When I was 
a boy we did all our cooking in the fireplace there. 
Now let’s cross the porch into the other room.” 

Here there was less disorder. The walls were 
whitewashed. In the fireplace were the remains of 
a fire which had evidently been burning not long 
before. 

Nancy wrinkled up her nose and began to sniff. 
“It smells like ghosts,” she decided. 

Everybody laughed at that. “Well, I’ll tell you 
something,” Squire chuckled. “I reckon it might be 
the ghost of my last supper still in the air. You see,” 
he explained, “in apple harvest time I have to be 



The House on Orchard Hill 


107 


kind o’ watchful or somebody else might gather my 
crop and not divide with me. So I camp out here 
pretty regular part o’ the year.” 

“You’re the ha’nt then,” Harriet told him. “Ever 
since the children at school heard about our plan to 
bring Mother and Father here, they have been warn' 
ing me to look out for ghosts. They say that an old 
man’s ghost stays here at night to guard the orchard 
which he planted many years ago. They say too that 
he carries a lighted, smoky lantern around among the 
trees to catch thieving marauders. Some say they’ve 
heard strange sounds as if the old fellow were sing' 
ing to keep himself company—a doleful sort of song.” 

The Squire laughed. “I’ve heard about that ha’nt 
myself,” he said. “Sometimes I mightmigh get scared 
o’ him from what folks tell me about him. But he 
doesn’t steal my apples, anyway, so I bear him no 
ill will. 

“Your Pappy and Mammy ought to feel at home 
here,” he went on. “Many and many a time we’ve 
had a merrymaking right in this room when we were 
young folks together. Not much difference in our 
ages—mine and your Pappy’s, though I guess I look 
a sight older to you than he does—my head got white 



io8 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


before the right time.” He smiled and pushed a wisp 
back from his forehead. “My wife says she’s ashamed 
to go out with me for fear folks that don’t know us 
well will think she’s about my third wife!” 

Dick and Bob had been exploring the attic room 
over their heads. 

“I’m going to have my place up there,” Dick an' 
nounced as he climbed down the wall by toeing 
cracks in the chinking. “I’ll make me a ladder stair' 
way—the kind that’s fastened with a hinge. Then I 
can draw it up after me when I want to mind my 
own business,” and he looked in a meaningful way 
at Nancy, who, if she understood, gave no sign. 

“Good place to sleep,” said the Squire. “When the 
rain is on the roof.” 

Then they went out to inspect the apple orchard. 
A few of the trees were well laden; others had a 
scanty crop. 

“About half a crop this year,” the Squire observed. 
“Fellow at the county seat says I ought to spray ’em. 
A newfangled notion, I guess.” 

“We learned how to do that in school last year,” 
Dick told him, “and practised on the neighbors’ fruit 
trees. Everybody begged our teacher to bring us 








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Then they went out to inspect the apple orchard 






















The House on Orchard Hill 


hi 


back and let us do it again this year. They offered 
to pay us for it, too.” 

“Must be something to it then,” the Squire an- 
swered. “Might try it out if you stay here.” 

They found a few ripe apples on one tree. King 
o’ Thompsons, the Squire called them, and all sat 
down in the shade to rest and sample them. 

Quickly the talk centered on getting the old cabin 
in readiness—what to do first and how much the 
necessary supplies would cost. 

“I’ll be able to buy new shingles and nails when I 
get pay for my first month’s work,” Harriet said. 
“There’ll be a lot of expenses, so we’ll buy just what 
we have to. We’ll clean up and patch up as much 
as we can. And we can do a lot after school by com' 
ing across the hollow and saving time that way. 
Then on Saturday we’ll get up early and work till 
dark. Oh, it’s going to be fun. It really is.” 

“Well, I’m with you,” Squire assured her. “Been 
needing a caretaker for a long time. And here I’ve 
got half a dozen. Good business for me!” 

They would not have to pay any rent if they 
stayed as much as a year, not a penny, he declared. 
Fixing up this old cabin until it was fit to live in 



112 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


would pay for their staying in it that long. And 
they could have all the fruit they could use, too. He 
would need help in picking later on, and they could 
lend him a hand on that as well as in marketing it. 
Come to think of it, there might be a bit of money 
for them in the marketing. Good business for every' 
body. 

As they walked homeward that afternoon Harriet 
was thinking how right Granny had been that the 
dark clouds would soon lift a bit, the shadows grow 
lighter. 

That night she wrote to her father and mother, 
describing the old cabin not so much in present 
reality as the way it would be after it had been 
changed by willing hands into a home'place. As she 
wrote she imagined Mother’s face when Father read 
the letter aloud to her. Her pen raced, and before 
she knew it, she had filled six pages with the descrip' 
tion of the little home of her dream. 

But Harriet’s dream of Orchard Hill cabin was 
more than a pretty picture hanging on the wall of 
her mind. It was definite enough and practical enough 
to serve as a working pattern. After she had finished 
the letter, she jotted down a page of notes on what 



The House on Orchard Hill 


111 

had to be done to make the old cabin liveable. They 
could use clean flour sacks to make window screens. 
The walls which were blackened with smoke could 
be whitewashed at very little cost. The bare floors 
would be more attractive with a few crocheted rag 
rugs and comhusk mats. Instead of pictures on the 
walls they would hang sprays of wild berries. The 
place would look like a dryad’s house before Harriet 
had finished. 

Flower beds should be made in the yard too, 
spreading around the doorstep, bordering the flag¬ 
stone walk. Here Harriet would have hollyhock, 
marigolds, old maids, sweet william — all old fash¬ 
ioned flowers transplanted from other friendly yards. 
How Mother would love the fine show! 

But there must be cleanliness and comfort first of 
all. The nice touches could come a little later on. 

Squire Caudil, who had promised to keep an eye 
open for the needed repair materials was as good 
as his word. A day or so later, after a trip to Slab 
Town, he rode up to report that an old house was 
being tom down over there and that window sashes, 
floor boards and planks of dressed lumber could be 
bought for a song. 




The Mail Wagon Mystery 


X14 

“I’ve got to make another trip to town tomorrow, 
Harriet, and if you like I’ll bring a passel o’ that 
stuff along. Then it’ll be on hand when we start 
working,” he concluded. 

Harriet considered this proposal. It seemed, in¬ 
deed, a very fine plan, but she mustn’t go into debt 
at the very outset of this venture. 

“I had better wait to buy till I draw my teaching 
salary,” she said frankly. “That won’t be so long 
now—the end of next week.” 

“Humph!” the Squire laughed. “Then likely as 
not somebody will beat you to the bargain. Did you 
ever hear anything about the early bird and the 
worm?” 

Harriet smiled. “Yes I have, but this bird would 
rather not be early than to go into debt. Father 
never would let us buy anything on time.” 

“Humph. Pretty good notion, at that, I reckon. 
It is a pity more folks never got it into their heads. 
But Harriet, we’ve got to work fast if we want to 
take advantage of this bargain. Look here, you 
wouldn’t mind if I managed things a bit, would you? 
After all, it’s a big help to me to get the old place 
fixed up again and nice folks living in it. I’ve been 



The House on Orchard Hill 


HI 

thinking. To tell you the truth there’s a botheration 
on my mind. Seems like I’m eating the apple myself 
and letting you folks nibble the core. With some 
folks I wouldn’t care at all—or less mighty little, for 
it’s my nature to do a fellow before he does me! 
But I never planned, and I don’t aim now, to drive 
a sharp bargain on the rent for Orchard Hill cabin. 
I said you could have it a year for fixing it up—but 
that would be a cheat. When I made that propose 
tion, I didn’t reckon that there would be so tamal 
much fixing to do. Tell you what. I’ll go ahead and 
buy the stuff myself. I’ll put in the windows and 
repair the floor. You can do what you like later on: 
fix the roof, mend the fence and prettify things a 
little.” 

Harriet felt a surge of gratitude sweeping over her 
and at this proof of his friendship tears came into 
her eyes. 

“Thank you. Oh, thank you,” she murmured 
huskily. “I do appreciate your kindness, and I hope 
that by and by I’ll be able really to show you my— 
our gratitude. We’ll all do our best to prove how 
glad we are to have our home'place on Orchard 
Hill.” 




Chapter XI 

TROUBLE ON THE TRAIL 


The next morning at school one of the children 
came in with a note for Harriet. 

“Mary Ann Coomer brought it down to our house 
and got me to bring it,” the small boy said, holding 
out a soiled envelope. 

Harriet waited until she was alone, then nervously 
tore open the envelope. Drawing out the scrap of 
tablet paper inside, she unfolded it and read: 

I want to see you this afternoon somewhere near 
Cross Roads. Send the others on so you can be by 
yourself. I’ve got something I want to tell you. I’ll 
be on the lookout for you to come along, but if you 
are not by yourself, I won’t come out of my hiding- 
place. 

Mary Ann 
116 





Trouble on the Trail 


117 

Harriet wondered what it could be that Mary Ann 
wanted to tell her. Was any new trouble afoot? 
The question stayed in her mind with dogged per* 
sistency all through the day as she tried to concern 
trate on her teaching. And when she tried to make 
herself smile, she felt as if she were pulling a string 
behind the solemn mask of her face. 

“Are you sick? Is something the matter?” Nancy 
asked her more than once. 

“Oh, I’m all right,” Harriet answered each time, 
almost gruffly. “Don’t imagine things, Nancy.” 

She let school out a little early that day, sending 
the rest of the family home ahead, and lingering 
after all the pupils had taken the up-hollow trail. 
When they had disappeared, she started out slowly. 
At Cross Road Bend she stopped and waited. No 
Mary Ann in sight. Then upon her ear fell a faint 
rustle—a foot moving through dry leaves. A twig 
snapped nearby, and Mary Ann appeared like a wood 
sprite. 

Harriet jumped nervously. “I thought maybe you 
hadn’t come,” she said. 

“I was behind that clump of trees, hiding from the 
others,” Mary Ann told her. “I thought you’d get 



n8 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


here before this. And when you didn’t come, I got 
afraid you might not remember to stop at the right 
place. If you hadn’t come to talk, I didn’t see what 
I could do. There’s such a lot of trouble and it’s 
all so mixed up.” 

She paused for breath, then began twisting her 
hands in an unconsciously pitiful gesture. Harriet 
took the twisting hands in hers and said quietly, “Sit 
down here on this rock, Mary Ann. Now tell me. 
What is the matter?” 

“Listen,” Mary Ann nearly choked on the words, 
“Harriet, listen to me, and pay attention to what I 
tell you. There’s trouble, bad trouble ahead. They’re 
going to dynamite the mine tonight. Don’t let your 
Uncle Matt go there. It’s his turn for watch duty. 
But tell him not to go tonight!” 

Harriet had expected nothing so dreadful as this. 

“Oh, how terrible!” she exclaimed. “Tell me all 
you know, Mary Ann. Quickly.” 

The other’s face darkened. “It’s that—that Jones,” 
she said in a whisper. “He’s a bad ’un, Harriet. You 
can tell by his face—it looks like the Devil’s in that 
picture, The Temptation. And he is a tempter, too. 
He comes down to our house nearly every night and 



Trouble on the Trail 


119 

talks as long and loud as any preacher man you ever 
heard in a meeting house. Louder, even.” 

“And your folks—do they listen to him? Do they 
believe what he says?” Harriet asked her cousin. 

Mary Ann hung her head miserably. “He’s about 
won Pappy,” she said, “just like he has a lot of the 
other men. But Pappy’s not as bad as Jones—and I 
hope to the good Lord he never will be. He agreed 
to go on strike for getting more money, but he never 
would agree to the other, unless that Jones got him 
worked up to doing it.” 

“You mean,” said Harriet with a quick keen look, 
“the dynamiting of the mine?” 

“Yes,” Mary Ann nodded again. “I heard them 
talking about it, and Pappy said no. He wouldn’t go 
that far, he said. But that Jones has gotten him to 
say he’ll come to the big meeting at Middle Mine 
tonight.” 

“But I don’t see,” cried Harriet out of her increas- 
ing confusion, “I just can’t see why they’re doing 
this. If they do blow up the mine, what do they 
hope to gain by it?” 

“More money—they think it will make the mine 
owners pay bigger wages,” Mary Ann answered. 



120 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


“Don’t you see, they mean the dynamiting for a 
sign, a warning of more trouble that’ll happen if the 
mine owners won’t listen to Jones and his crowd.” 

“But Uncle Matt says that the mine owners are 
hard pushed just to keep the mines open during these 
bad times. He says they can’t afford to raise their 
pay, especially right now when coal sales are off.” 

Mary Ann did not reply. Getting to her feet and 
pulling her bonnet in place, she looked at her cousin 
with a pathetic little frown between her eyes. 

“You won’t give me away?” she said then. “Tell 
your Uncle Matt. Tell him to heed the warning, but 
don’t let on where you got word of what’s to hap' 
pen tonight.” 

She held her breath, waiting to hear Harriet’s 
spoken promise. 

“I won’t give you away, Mary Ann,” promised 
Harriet. “And I’ll always be grateful to you for do' 
ing this, no matter what happens. If I can only keep 
Uncle Matt away from the mine tonight! But he 
may feel that he ought to go in spite of everything. 
He may think that it is his duty, to try to save the 
mine, you know. There won’t be time to get enough 
others to stand up to all that crowd.” 



Trouble on the Trail 


121 


“I don’t know how many there’ll be,” Mary Ann 
went on, “but Jones is counting on getting a crowd 
there.” 

“Well, I must hurry,” Harriet said, scrambling up. 
“Good-bye, Mary Ann. Thank you, oh, thank you 
for telling me! No matter what happens, no matter 
how all this trouble ends, you and I can be friends.” 

Mary Ann made no answer, and Harriet could see 
that her cousin was controlling her feelings with 
difficulty. A dry sob escaped as she turned in the 
pathway and disappeared the way she had come 
around the clump of trees. 

Harriet did not linger. Taking her own fork of 
the trail, she made as much haste uphill as possible. 

At the house she found that Uncle Matt had al¬ 
ready left for the mine. 

“He set off extra early,” Granny said, “to have a 
little time to stop at Squire Caudil’s on the way. Some 
business about the cabin on Orchard Hill, I think.” 

“Where’s Dick? And the others?” 

'’All gone to work on the cabin. They took them 
a bite before they left—called it early supper—and 
said they wouldn’t be back till dark. I never saw 
such young ’uns! You’d think they was bound for 



122 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


a county seat show or Fourth o’ July celebration. 
It beats all—such a hip'and'hurrah over work!” 

“Oh, Granny,” interrupted Harriet, “there’s more 
trouble than ever before. I don’t know what to do!” 

Granny looked at her quickly, surprised at the 
despair in her voice. “What can have happened, 
child? The boys and Nancy said nothing of any' 
thing wrong at school.” 

“Not there. Not at school. But Mary Ann wrote 
me a note and when I saw her—” She broke off and 
buried her face in her hands. 

In broken sentences of distress, Harriet sobbed out 
the story. “Can’t we get Uncle Matt to come away 
from the mine, Granny?” she cried when she had 
finished. Couldn’t you make him if you went after 
him now?” 

Granny shook her head. “Matt, he don’t know 
what all this stirring up of the men has got to do 
with his trouble. But it’s part and passel of it, some 
way or other. And the foreman’s stood by Matt, 
even when some of the men talked as no Christian 
man should about him. Matt’ll figure it’s the fore' 
man who’s in trouble now and he’ll stay right there, 
come what may.” 



Trouble on the Trail 


123 


“Oh, Granny! It’s just so dreadful, I—” 

“Hush, child!” said Granny. “Hush and let me 
think.” 

For long moments, the old woman looked off into 
the distance. “You couldn’t do anything just asking 
him to come away from watching the mine,” at 
length she repeated slowly. “Not a thing in the 
world. Their planting dynamite’ll just make him that 
much more set in staying. And running all around 
Far Beyant and trying to get the other men that’re 
sticking by the mine will only bring on a fight. Jones 
and his crowd are just laying for ’em. There must 
be some—way—if—only—I—can—think— ” 
Harriet waited with baited breath. And when a 
sudden gleam shot into Granny’s eyes, her heart 
leaped in hope. Granny had thought of something! 

“Listen, child,” the old woman said, turning quick' 
ly to look into her granddaughter’s eyes. In terse 
words she went on to describe a plan so daring that 
Harriet could scarcely believe her ears. 

“But, Granny—” she began. 

But there was no time to voice her doubts as to the 
plan’s success, in the bustle of Aunt Lissie’s return 
from a neighbor’s. At Granny’s excited request, she 



The Mail Wagon Mystery 


124 

must again recount Mary Ann’s warning and revela¬ 
tion. And as soon as she had finished, Granny took 
charge, describing her plan to her daughter and add¬ 
ing details that grew with the telling. 

“I’ve alius had the notion that we womenfolks 
could do more’n we have, to stop this everlasting 
fighting and feuding,” she declared. 

At her words, Harriet smiled quickly. Just what 
she had thought! 

“And when you come right down to it, that’s 
what’s back of this Jones getting a headway on Thun- 
derhead,” went on Granny. “If the men hadn’t been 
forever at each other, but had been going along to¬ 
gether instead, a foreigner like him would have been 
chased out long ago. This dynamite business may be 
just what we’ve been needing to bring the menfolk 
to their senses. What do you say, Lissie?” 

“May be no harm to try,” Aunt Lissie replied. 

“It’ll be a miracle if it works,” Granny went on. 
“And what I’d like right now is some time to pray 
over it. Miracles by rights had ought to be prayed 
for. But we ain’t got time to stop for any praying. 
We’ve got to start right now.” 

As she reached for her bonnet, she added, “At 




0 


“We’ve got to start right now” 






























Trouble on the Trail 


127 


that, we don't need to miss praying. We can pray 
as we go. I never said my prayers on a mule’s back 
before, but I will this time. Harriet, you write a 
note to tell the young 'uns to stay right here when 
they get back. And, Lissie, you go get Dock ready.” 

Harriet and Aunt Lissie walked on each side of 
Dock, the mule, as he took Granny down No-End 
Trail. At each of the cabins along the way, they 
stopped and Granny called loudly, “Quick! Matter 
of life and death!” At her call, the women came 
running. In swift dramatic words, she told her news 
and announced her plan. 

“Remember—it’s all us womenfolk at Middle Mine 
at eight o’clock back in that patch of woods and not 
a word to the menfolk!” 

Murray and Coomer women alike listened to her. 
Listened, and promised. “We’ll be there,” they said. 

No feud had ever existed between Granny and 
any of them. A good neighbor, Granny had never 
refused to answer the call of trouble. In perplexity, 
too, they had sought her out, asking her advice. And 
Granny had not failed them. From her wise old head 
and her understanding heart, they had received wis¬ 
dom that had stood by them well. 



128 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


Now they nodded in agreement when Granny said, 
“We’ve got to save our menfolk in spite of them' 
selves. Menfolk around here are alius too ready for a 
fight. And right now too many of ’em are drunk 
on that Jones’s lies. ’Tisn’t only this dynamite. They’ll 
go right on fighting one another till kingdom come. 
But they won’t fight their womenfolk—that they 
won’t. I wish I’d have thought of something like 
this before. Remember—the Middle Mine at eight 
o’clock.” 

But although all agreed to the rightness of Gran- 
ny’s words, and although all promised to be at the 
Middle Mine at eight o’clock, some of the promises 
were given so fearfully and with such hesitation, that 
Harriet whispered anxiously as Dock started off once 
more, “Will they come? Will they dare to do it?” 

“I wouldn’t be surprised if every blessed one shows 
up,” Aunt Lissie replied confidently. “The notion’s 
been put in their heads, and Granny’s the one who’s 
done it. Likely, they’ll remember what she said that 
the men’ll go right on fighting till kingdom come 
less’n we do something about it. And she’s right. 
We’ve got to get ourselves more peaceful on Thun' 
derhead Mountain, that’s what we’ve got to do.” 




Chapter XII 

THE MEETING AT THE MINE 


At eight o’clock, from her place beside Granny, 
Harriet peered at the mouth of Middle Mine. It 
looked like a black patch on the gray shawl of the 
gathering twilight, she thought, a patch on a shawl 
draped across the shoulder of Thunderhead Moun' 
tain. Against the patch, a crowd of men moved 
back and forth like people in a shadow picture, step' 
ping softly, speaking in whispers. Here and there 
lights flared—the hissing flame of a pine torch, the 
carbide lights of a miner’s cap, the occasional flash 
of a match—and the face of some man was revealed. 


129 


130 


The Mart Wagon Mystery 


It was threatening, sinister. At the sight, Harriet’s 
heart quailed. 

Around Granny, the womenfolk pressed close in 
silence. All were there. Not one had failed to keep 
her promise. But now, standing in the darkness and 
looking at the menacing group of men, no longer did 
Granny’s plan seem anything but a fanciful dream 
of hope. Harriet caught her breath in sudden fear. 

“Matt’s nowhere about,’’ commented Granny in a 
low voice. 

“Nor that Jones either,” added Aunt Lissie, peer' 
ing in the direction of the mine. “One or the other 
of ’em’d have been speaking right up if they was 
around.” 

“I don’t mind the furriner being away,” com' 
mented Granny. “Good riddance, if you ask me. 
And I’m not worryin’ any over Matt neither. He’s 
mindin’ his business whatever he’s doin’.” 

Perhaps, thought Harriet wildly, Uncle Matt had 
heard about the dynamite plot and had started right 
off after Mr. Jones. Perhaps he had caught him, had 
met him alone somewhere, out in the darkness on the 
mountain, and—oh! 

A woman beside her reached out and clutched her 



The Meeting at the Mine 


i3 1 

arm. “Do you reckon it’ll work? Do you reckon 
they’ll pay us any attention if we do what Granny 
Murray figgered will help?” she asked. A quaver in 
her voice betrayed her hesitation and fear. 

Harriet threw back her head. “Of course it’s go- 
ing to work,” she said confidently, and found her 
own doubts conquered by the words. 

“We won’t have to wait long now,” Granny told 
them all then. “Things are about to head up, I guess.” 

“Do you think they’ve seen us?” a woman nearby 
now asked. 

Granny chuckled. “Of course they have. But they 
ain’t troublin’ about it any. They’re thinkin’ we’ve 
come to help ’em celebrate. They hain’t caught on 
to its being a surprise party.” 

Suddenly Mary Ann rushed up. “They’ve been 
waiting for that Mr. Jones,” she told Harriet breath' 
lessly. “But they’ve decided that if he doesn’t come 
soon, they’ll go ahead and dynamite anyway.” 

Sure enough, from the crowd before the entrance 
of the mine there now came a united movement that 
bespoke action. 

“Wonder what’s happened to him,” Harriet heard 
one man call. 



132 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


“Maybe word got out and the foreman put the 
sheriff on his trail,” answered another man loudly. 

“Might be. But we don’t need him. We’ll show 
’em—” 

Granny held up her hand. “Now!” she cried. 
“Pass the word along.” 

From mouth to mouth through the half'hidden 
group of women the word went. 

“Now!” 

“Now!” 

They moved forward together. Moved as a body, 
and with such a determined swiftness, that the men' 
folk stood silent and motionless until their women 
stood squarely across the entrance of the mine. 

“Hey, you womenfolks! You get out of here!” 
shouted the men then. 

The women did not move. 

The protest gathered force. “What do you think 
you’re doing? This ain’t any business of yours!” 

Still the women did not reply. Then the men 
started toward them, and the womenfolk turned and 
walked into the entrance of the mine where they 
were quickly engulfed in darkness. 

This was too much! 



The Meeting^ at the 'Mine 


i 33 


“Sally!” a cry rang out. “If yo’re there, you come 
right back. Hear me?” No Sally answered. No Sally 
appeared. 

“Martha! Hear me?” 

“Tilly! You get right back home!” 

The night air rang with indignant commands. But 
until a single figure moved from the mine hole, there 
was no slightest sign that any of the women inside 
had heard a word. 

When a match sputtered and a candle gleamed to 
life in the hand of the moving figure, “It’s Granny! 
It’s Granny Murray!” several voices in front of the 
crowd informed the rest. 

“What you all up to, Granny?” somebody cried 
from the edge of the crowd. 

Granny lifted the candle and shed its light on the 
faces nearby. And when her one hand trembled, she 
steadied its shaking with the other and began to 
, speak. But her voice did not tremble. 

* “Listen to me, you menfolks, my kin and neigh¬ 
bors. I’m the oldest person here and I guess that 
gives me the right to my say. Listen to me and you’ll 
understand what we womenfolks are up to. There’s 
an evil one in our midst and he has led you into evil. 



134 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


It’s a wrongful thing that you plan tonight. No good 
will come to any of you from it. And what harms 
you, harms us. That’s why we’re here—to look after 
you like we’ve always done.” 

“The miners mean to have their rights,” some¬ 
body shouted. “Yes! Yes!” echoed on all sides. 

“That’s true,” agreed Granny. “That’s what you 
should have. But dynamitin’ this mine’s not going to 
bring ’em. The mine'll be wrecked and there won’t 
be any work for anybody. Yore children’ll starve 
here on Thunderhead, and we womenfolk’ll have to 
stand beside ’em and hear ’em cry.” 

Granny paused, but from the darkness no answer 
or protest came from the men. 

“We haven’t any guns on us,” Granny went on. 
“And we don’t need ’em, ’cause we’re goin’ to stay 
right where we are till you-all get good and ready to 
behave yourselves. And you’ll not go dynamitin’ 
yore womenfolk, I’m thinkin’.” 

Suddenly, someone on the edge of the crowd 
laughed. And a man’s voice shouted, “Whoopee! 
Who said our womenfolks aren’t smart?” 

In relief, the others took it up. “Hooray for Gran¬ 
ny! Hooray for Granny!” 













The Meeting at the Mine 


127 


“Just a minute,” shouted Granny above the banter. 
“Maybe you think it’s a thing to laugh over, this 
fightin’ among yourselves, but we womenfolk don’t. 
We’re sick and tired of it. And what’s more, we’re 
not goin’ to stand it any more. You men have got to 
start pullin’ together here on Thunderhead. Man 
against man, cousin against cousin—the idea! It’s got 
to stop, I tell you. You act like a passel of young ’uns. 
And if I had my way. I’d lick the lot o’ you!” 

An uneasy laugh rippled through the crowd. 

“What’s more, there’s things been goin’ on here- 
abouts that no Christian man should stand for,” 
Granny now declared. “We’ve got to get together. 
We’ve got to join hands on gettin’ things done that 
need doin’. And if bigger wages here in this mine is 
part of it, we’ll work on that, too. But to my notion, 
more wages’re not goin’ to come your way by dyna- 
mitin’. No such thing. 

“Those that own this mine are different from those 
we’ve heard tell about some other places I could men¬ 
tion. That’s why my Matt come over here and stood 
by ’em. They’ll do better by us when they can. And 
if you’d stopped to use the minds God gave you, 
you’d have known it, too, I reckon!” 



133 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


As Granny Murray talked, the temper of the 
crowd slowly changed. Now man after man looked 
at his neighbor sheepishly. 

At length someone called, “Hey, Bill, can we toll 
’em out, you reckon, to get our breakfast in the 
morning?” 

“Better go and bring ’em featherbeds to make ’em 
comfortable,” another suggested. 

They were doing their best to make a joke of the 
womenfolks’ triumph. 

But Granny did not respond to their lightness. 
Without another word, she turned and once more 
vanished into the darkness. 

“You done real well, Granny Murray,” Aunt las¬ 
sie declared when the old woman rejoined them. 

“You told ’em,” added a neighbor. “Don’t you 
think we could leave now?” 

“They’ll not dynamite us,” Granny replied. “And 
they’ve started thinkin’. But ’twon’t hurt to stay on 
a bit longer. How about our singin’ a little some¬ 
thin’ now? It helps to cheer a-body up and passes 
time away.” 

“It does so,” Sally Coomer, Mary Ann’s mother, 
agreed. One time before the feud she had sat by 



The Meeting at the Mine 


139 


Lissie Murray in singing school and shared the Sacred 
Harp Song Book with her. That seemed long ago 
now. And here they were together. 

“There is a happy land 
Far, far away, 

Where saints in glory stand 
Bright, bright as day!” 

Mary Ann Coomer, standing by Harriet, sang 
with a clear, high voice, guided by memory from one 
stanza to the next. Harriet found herself singing 
too, following Mary Ann’s lead. When that song 
was done, they all took up another, an oldtime meet' 
ing house tune which Harriet had learned from 
Granny. It had a sweet, sad melody but a bright 
thread of hope ran through the words, stringing the 
stanzas together like somber beads on a gold cord. 

“Where now are the Hebrew children? 

Where now are the Hebrew children? 

Where now are the Hebrew children? 

Safe yonder in the Promised Land.” 

It was a lengthy song, this one, telling the happy 
fate of many people in both the Old and New Testa' 
ments. And when at last they had run out of Bible 
characters to sing about, they began on the kin and 
neighbors. By this time the men had joined in and 
a mighty chorus sang about the fortunate state of 



140 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


Aunt Malviney Murray, Unde Sol Coomer and a 
number of others. 

“The Circuit Rider ought to come along. We’d 
have a hip'and'hurrah certain sure,’’ Aunt Lissie said 
to Mrs. Coomer. 

“We would so,” the other agreed. “We could have 
a big meetin’, I allow. But I reckon this show is over 
for tonight.” 

“You are right,” said Granny. “Our job here is 
done for the time anyhow, I reckon. Let’s go out 
and see how the menfolks act.” 

Just then they heard a loud rumble and the very 
foundations of the mountain shook. 

Harriet seized Mary Ann on one side and Granny 
Murray on the other. 

“They have blown up the mine!” she cried, and 
her heart was paralyzed with fear. 

“Tain’t real dynamite, that,” said Granny. “Just 
the Lord’s dynamite. That’s thunder. We’re goin’ 
to have a storm.” 

Now the men began to call to the womenfolks: 

“Come on, Sally.” 

“Get out, Susie.” 

“Hurry up and git a move on ye, Ellender.” 




The. Meeting^ at the Mine 


141 

“We-all better get along home.” 

The women came out without protest, found their 
anxious, waiting partners and with brief farewells 
took their homeward way. The threatening thunder 
growled nearer, the blazing lightning split the dark 
sky. A number of smoky torches guided the groups 
that hurried away. Granny relit her candle and fixed 
it firmly in the homemade sconce. 

“Let me carry it for you. Granny,” Harriet offered. 

“Better maybe,” was Granny’s answer. “Neither 
my old hands or feet are as steady as they were once.” 

They went down the trail with Mary Ann’s fam¬ 
ily until the path divided. Mary Ann and her mother 
were as friendly as though there had never been a 
feud between the families. And although Mary 
Ann’s father stalked on ahead in silence, his pres¬ 
ence was no damper upon the chatter of the rest. 

Harriet looked at him thoughtfully. Was he still 
holding his grudge against them? Then she glanced 
at Mary Ann’s happy face. No, his silence could 
not mean continued hard feeling, otherwise his wife 
and daughter would not have dared to show their 
friendliness. But what was the significance of his 
walking on aloof? 



142 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


“I hope you reach home before the storm,” was 
Mrs. Coomer’s kind farewell. 

“And the same I wish for you,” answered Granny, 
while Mary Ann and Harriet with a brief handclasp 
whispered: 

“Good-bye.” 

“Good night.” And then, “We will see each other 
soon.” 

The first words Granny said when they were alone 
on the trail revealed the worry that had been with 
her all through the momentous evening. “Somethin’ 
has happened to Matt. He would have showed up 
if he could. That I know.” 

Harriet tried to reassure her. “Mr. Jones didn’t 
show up, either.” 

Then she wished she had kept that thought to 
herself, for Granny turned to her a face that revealed 
deep lines of anguish in the flickering candle light. 

“The Good Lord grant no harm has come to my 
son,” she said as if in prayer. 

As they drew near home Aunt Lissie broke the 
silence to wonder if the children were asleep. 

“We might as well slip to bed and not wake ’em 
up tonight,” she said. “If we do, they’ll have to 



The Meeting at the Mine 


M3 


hear the whole story, and then none of us will get 
any rest till nigh the break o’ day.” 

“In the note, I told them we’d be in late and not 
to wait up for us,” Harriet said. “I guess they were 
all tired enough to go to sleep right away.” 

They reached the front gate just ahead of the rain 
and entered the dogtrot shelter as the first down' 
pour descended above their heads. 

“The Lord be praised for shelter!” Granny cried. 

Someone stirred inside from a bed in a far comer. 

“Is that you, Granny? Harriet?” It was Nancy 
who spoke sleepily out of the dark. 

“Yes, yes, we are here, safe and sound,” Harriet 
told her. “Are all of you in bed? Are you all 
right?” she questioned. 

“Billy Boy and the twins and I are here. Bob and 
Dick followed Uncle Matt, I think. They left as 
soon as they read the note, and they wouldn’t tell 
me what they were up to, or where they were go- 
ing.” 

“Oh, oh,” Aunt Lissie began to wail. “What in 
the world has happened? What can we do? What 
can we do?” 

“You can stop wringin’ your hands and carryin 



144 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


on like that,” said Granny, speaking to her as sternly 
as if she were an upset young girl. “We’ve got to 
wait till this storm dies down and the Lord sends 
daylight again before we can see to do anything. And 
while we’re waitin’, we might as well lie down and 
get a little rest.” 

Then Aunt Lissie went to the fireplace and kindled 
a chip fire between the andirons on the hearth. The 
cheerful glow that soon spread through the room 
seemed to warm their hearts as well as their hands. 
Outside the storm was hurling long javelins of rain 
against the roof. The wind put its shoulder to the 
door like a giant bent on coming inside to wreak 
destruction upon them. But the little hearth fire 
flickered bravely, defying the enemy and sending up 
its red banner of hope before the weary watchers. 

Suddenly, during a lull in the wind, and between 
the gusts of rain, a cry was heard beyond the door: 

“Open. Open. Open!” 






Chapter XIII 

AN UNEXPECTED GUEST 
The four of them scrambled toward the door, 
stumbling in their hurry over chairs and bumping 
against one another on the way. It was Harriet’s 
hand which lifted the latch. The wild wind swung 
the door inward with a violence that nearly stunned 
her. She pushed her hair back and peered out, the 
others crowding closely behind her, looking over her 
shoulder and crying one question: “Who is it?” 

A strange sight met their eyes: a crumpled figure 
on a stretcher made from a man’s overcoat with poles 
pushed through the arms and lashed to the tails. 


i45 




146 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


The burden bearers were Uncle Matt, Dick, Bob and 
Buck Coomer. The man on the stretcher they could 
not recognize for the side of his face was concealed 1 
by a hand spread awkwardly, the fingers outstretched 
stiffly, reminding Harriet of spider legs. 

“Jones,” Uncle Matt spoke briefly. “Nowhere 
else to take him.” 

In silence, they brought their load inside the room 
and laid it down before the fire. The figure stirred, 
and a groan came from the mouth that seemed to, 
open involuntarily. 

“Maybe he’s dyin’,” Aunt Lissie whispered breath' 
lessly. 

The dark face turned from the fire then, and 
black eyes snapped open. 

“What have you fools done with me? I’m hurt. 
Get me a doctor.” 

The little circle shrank away from the menace in 
the voice that struck like a blow. All but Granny. 
She took a step nearer and poked up the fire. 

“Throw on a pine knot. I reckon, Mr. Jones, 
you’ll have to let me doctor you as best I can. What 
seems to ail you mostly?” 

“My back, my arms, my legs—” he groaned. 



An Unexpected Guest 


W 


“Oh. Ouch! Every bone in my body is broken.” 

“Not so bad as all that,” Uncle Matt said. “He 
had a bad fall, certain, and sprained a muscle or two 
somewhere, busted an ankle, maybe, but I looked 
him over before we set out, and there’s nothin’ worse 
the matter with him.” 

“Humph. We’ll see. I’ll see, anyway,” Granny 
said. “Matt, you and Lissie stay here and help me. 
You—all the rest o’ you young ones, go and make 
another fire in the big room. Harriet and Nancy, 
get dry clothes for the boys to put on. As soon as 
I see to this man person, I'll brew a big kettle o’ 
boneset tea to dose up everybody.” 

As the boys went into the big room, they saw that 
Buck Coomer had slipped away. “Too bashful to 
stay,” said Bob. 

When a fire had been kindled in the big room, 
piled high in spendthrift fashion till the hot flames 
roared and licked red tongues high up the throat of 
the chimney, the boys got into dry clothes behind a 
screen in one comer made by sheets stretched over 
chairs. While they dressed, their tongues were busy 
for they were as eager to tell their tale as the girls 
were anxious to hear it. 



148 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


“Buck Coomer, he warned us about the meetin’ 
at the mine,” Bob told them. “Seems like he did it 
on account of Mary Ann bein’ so worried over it. 
He waylaid us on our way home from the cabin and 
took us off by ourselves to tell us what Jones’s gang 
meant to do. He was scared to death that his pappy 
would find out he had cheeped, but we promised to 
keep his secret, so he went along home and—” Bob 
paused, and everybody cried, “Go on!” But Bob was 
breathless so Dick took up the tale. 

“We meant to tell Granny and ask her what to do. 
But you’d gone and when we read your note, we 
started off after Uncle Matt to warn him. Well, up 
on the trail where it bends around the shoulder of 
the mountain we caught sight of Uncle Matt down 
below. He was acting sort of funny, slipping along 
as if he were tracking something. And he was!” 

“Mr. Jones!” Nancy guessed. “Go on, Dick, go 
on!” 

Dick frowned at his sister’s interruption. “Yes, 
it was Jones,” he admitted. “We saw him running 
like forty around another loop in the trail. 

“Well, Bob and I decided to head him off and we 
thought the best way to do it was to backtrack our' 




An Unexpected^ Guest 


14,9 


selves for a quarter of a mile and surprise him on 
the bend in the trail where it crosses the creek. 
There’s a foot-log there. It was getting late by this 
time and real dark in the woods. But we hurried 
as fast as we could.” 

“Weren’t you afraid he might — might—shoot 
you?” Nancy demanded, her eyes glowing. 

“Of course we thought of that,” said Dick, “but 
we had to take a chance, and we could tell he was 
pulling away from Uncle Matt. Besides, even if Uncle 
Matt had caught up with him, Uncle would’ve 
needed us. Jones is a lot bigger man than Uncle Matt 
and we knew Uncle would have had a hard time 
managing him alone.” 

He paused again, glancing around to make sure 
the girls were following his story. Satisfied, he rushed 
on to the climax. 

“Well, we got to the foot-log just as he started to 
dash across. When we yelled, he looked around and 
that made him slip off the log and tumble into the 
creek. There are a lot of big boulders there, and he 
caught his foot under one of them and cracked his 
head against another when he fell. He was knocked 
unconscious and his leg got twisted, too.” 



* 5 ° 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


“What did you do then," asked Nancy, “bring 
him to?" 

Dick gave his sister a disgusted look. “We fished 
him out, of course. That is, we managed it after 
Uncle Matt came up to give us a hand. Saved him 
from drowning, all right.” 

Breathlessly his audience waited for the rest of 
the story. 

“Then we made a fire to warm us by,” Dick went 
on with vast satisfaction in their absorbed attention. 
“When Jones opened his eyes, and tried to get up, 
his leg buckled under him. So we fixed a stretcher 
out of one of our coats. But by that time, the storm 
was coming down on us. It wasn’t any easy job, I 
can tell you, carrying him along that trail. I don’t 
know what we would have done if Buck Coomer 
hadn’t happened along to give us a hand. Then we 
got home and that’s all.” 

“I’m thankful it came out all right,” said Harriet, 
“and that he didn’t attack you and Uncle Matt. It’s 
lucky Uncle Matt chased him, too, because other' 
wise he would have gotten back to the mine and then 
perhaps Granny’s plan wouldn’t have worked out 
so well there.” 



An Unexpected Guest 


I5£ 

“What happened at the mine?” asked Bob. 

Harriet told her story briefly, cutting it short when 
Granny came in, bearing a black kettle from which 
arose a steam heavy with a pungent, bitter odor. 

“One drink around for everybody and a good one, 
too,” said the old woman, holding out a big dipper 
nearly full of the potent brew. “Boneset and a dash 
of pennyr’yal to keep you all from ketchin’ cold.” 

Harriet took the dipper and swallowed the first 
dose to set a good example to the others, and espe¬ 
cially to please Granny who with the best of inten¬ 
tions dosed the household on the least excuse. The 
boys fled before her, but the little old woman pur¬ 
sued them with determination, cornering them and 
making them take a good measure of the bitter dose. 

“Now off to bed with you all,” she commanded. 
“Did you know it was after midnight?” 

“What about — our guest?” Harriet lingered to 
make inquiry of her. 

“Well enough,” was the answer. “He’s sound ex¬ 
cept for a sprained ankle and some bad bruises. I’ve 
got three different kinds o’ poultices on him, and 
they’ll draw most o’ the ailments out. What do you 
look like that for, honey?” 



152 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


Harriet smiled tremulously. “I was just wishing. 
Granny, that you knew how to make a poultice that 
could draw out the wickedness in him.” 

“That would take black magic,” answered Granny 
with a crooked little grin. “And I don’t hold with 
that.” 

Harriet returned with her to the room where Mr. 
Jones was now sleeping on a pallet bed before the 
fire that had died to a bed of glowing embers. In the 
shadowed light the lines of his face seemed sinister, 
full of threat. Harriet turned away with a slight 
shudder. 

Granny laid her hand upon her granddaughter’s 
shoulder. “ ‘If thine enemy hunger, feed him,’ ” she 
quoted, “ ‘if he thirst, give him to drink.’ That’s out 
of the Good Book, honey, and I reckon that means 
give a bed to your enemy when he’s in bodily pain. 
Leastways, that’s how I understand it.” 

Harriet put her arms around Granny’s neck. “You 
are so good, Granny. Good night.” She turned away 
quickly and started up to bed. On the way she ran 
into Dick. 

“Harriet!” he whispered. 

“Why, Dick, what are you up for? I thought 






Mr. Jones was now sleeping on a pallet bed 






























An Unexpected Guest 


155 


Granny sent you off to bed a long time ago!” 

“Harriet,” Dick’s tone was excited, though muted 
warily, “do you suppose he could be the one who 
took the money?” His voice died down to a ghost 
of a whisper. “Maybe he had the money with him, 
and was running away with it. Maybe he stole the 
miners’ money. If we can prove it, Uncle Matt will 
be cleared of the charge against him. Where’s that 
coat?” 

“Don’t be silly, Dick,” Harriet began, “you’ve 
just got that book on your—” 

A sudden creak of a loose board beyond in the 
darkness of the kitchen interrupted. Harriet caught 
her breath in fear. The cabin seemed so different 
with Mr. Jones there. But it wasn’t a step, evidently. 

“He was just rolling over, I guess,” Dick whis- 
pered in a moment. “Honestly he could have done 
it, Harriet. He’s the meanest man around here.” 

“Come out into the dogtrot,” Harriet told him 
then. “There’s something I want to say to you.” 

Out in the dogtrot, Harriet put her mouth close 
to Dick’s ear. “Listen, Dick,” she said firmly, “don’t 
you go talking about these ideas of yours that don’t 
lead anywhere. Granny’s going to look after Mr. 



156 


The Mart Wagon Mystery 


Jones because he’s hurt and it doesn’t matter to her 
what he’s like, otherwise. If you get the children 
started, they’ll upset him and he’ll be that much 
harder to take care of.” 

Beside them, hanging on some nails, were the wet 
things Granny had taken from them all. 

“Look, Harriet,” was Dick’s sole reply. “Here’s 
his long coat. I’m going to search it.” 

Eagerly he thrust his hands into the soggy pockets, 
the ones inside as well as those outside, but with no 
reward for his pains. 

“Every single one empty,” he muttered disgust' 
edly. 

“What did I tell you—” Harriet began. But Dick 
was gone. 

So weary that she had lost all feeling except a 
halLnumb longing to drop into bed, Harriet climbed 
the stairs. What Granny had done was fine. School, 
too, would be a happier place now. Remembering 
the friendliness on the trail, as they had come home, 
Harriet felt sure that the Coomers and Murrays 
would now forget their feud, or at least enough of 
it to make things a little better. But what of Uncle 
Matt, she thought, as she made ready for bed? 




Chapter XIV 
THE DAY AFTER 

When Harriet awoke next morning the sun was 
streaming through the window, and a breath of 
honeysuckle scented the air. Nowhere was there a 
hint of the storm to remind her of the night before. 
At the sound of a voice in the kitchen, she leaped 
out of bed and dressing hurriedly, ran out to see 
what was happening. 

Breakfast had been eaten, she could see with one 
glance at the table, and Nancy was washing things 
up. Nobody else was in sight. 

“It’s a good thing it’s Saturday,” said Nancy by 


i57 



158 


The Matt Wagon Mystery 


way of greeting. “Do you know what time of day 
it is? Nearly ten o’clock!” 

“And I don’t feel half awake yet. But I am more 
than half hungry! Where are all the family?” 

“Here and there,” was Nancy’s reply. “Granny’s 
out in the garden. Aunt Lissie has gone to the store. 
The others hurried away right after breakfast to 
work on the cabin. Uncle Matt’s at the bam, I 
think. Mr. Jones is out in the dogtrot.” 

Glancing toward the door, Harriet smiled and 
spoke with loud cheerfulness. “Yes, it’s a beautiful 
morning.” Then dropping her voice she asked, 
“What is he doing?” 

“I think he’s plotting something against us,” Nancy 
whispered ominously. 

“Don’t be silly, Nancy,” Harriet whispered back. 
“What is there to be afraid of?” 

“Just the way he looks makes me sure he’s up to 
no good,” declared Nancy. “As though he’s figuring 
something out in his mind, I mean.” 

A sudden shadow fell across the square of sun that 
lay like a rag in the kitchen door, which opened into 
the dogtrot. 

Nancy nudged Harriet. “Those beans in the pot 



The Day After 


159 


will bum if I don’t pour some water on them right 
now,” she said clearly. 

Harriet got up. “I think I’d like some honey on 
this piece of bread.” 

With eyes upon the door, they chattered on. 
There was no sound in the dogtrot save the rustle of 
the honeysuckle vines in the wind. Yet the sense 
of suspense remained, and the girls were relieved 
when they heard Granny singing as she came in from 
the yard. If her stalwart old heart held any forebod' 
ing or fear that pleasant morning, no one could have 
told it. She sang a snatch of the time that always 
came from her lips when her soul was full of the 
spirit of real thanksgiving: 

“The Lord’s our Rock, In Him we hide 
A shelter in the time of storm!” 

Her feet tarried at the front step. 

“Now, Mr. Jones,” she scolded, “you’ve got that 
leg out o’ kilter again. Can’t I turn my back on you 
for the time it takes to draw a good breath but you 
get the poultice twisted away from the place where 
it ought to be? But I never did see a man person 
who could behave when he had somethin’ the matter 
with him. The only way to keep ’em quiet would 



i6o 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


be to hit ’em in the head, and addle their brains a 
mite, I guess. Menfolks are worrisome creatures.” 

Dumping down her basket of vegetables, she pulled 
up a chair and bent over the dark man who now lay 
sprawled on the floor where a quilt had been spread 
for him. Under his head was his folded coat. 

Harriet and Nancy watched her from the kitchen 
door. Granny worked as tenderly with this stranger 
as if he were her own kin or a neighbor. The man 
said nothing. His head turned, he kept his eyes on 
the trail that led down the mountain. 

Uncle Matt now came in at the back door with 
a piece of broken harness. “You girls wouldn’t know 
where I could find a piece of good stout thread, 
would you? I’ve used up all the shoe thread I had 
and this job’s not finished. Want to hurry up too, 
for I’ve got to go to Slab Town in the afternoon. 
Going to haul some window frames for the old 
cabin. Thought I’d better fix this harness. If the 
horses ran away, there would be smithereens o’ glass 
all up and down this mountain. Where’s your gran¬ 
ny? She’ll know about the thread.” 

Harriet nodded her head. “Out there,” in a sig¬ 
nificant tone. Just then Granny entered the kitchen, 



The Day After 


161 


and while she was hunting for the needed thread, the 
girls proceeded to tidy up the room which had been 
long neglected. 

Granny found the harness thread for Uncle Matt 
and sent him on about his business while she and the 
girls busied themselves with preparations for the 
noon-day meal. Granny’s spirits, Harriet could not 
help seeing, were noticeably uplifted. There was no 
mistaking that. 

“You seem none the worse for last night’s adven¬ 
ture,” Harriet told her as she sat opposite shelling 
peas to go into the pot. 

Granny lifted her wrinkled old face and her mouth 
twitched at the comers. 

“The Lord delivered the enemy into our hands,” 
she said softly, “and I am thankful for His mercies. 
Last night’s trouble is ended, and the worst that could 
have taken place never came to pass.” Then drop¬ 
ping her voice, she added, “Seems that it wasn’t 
meant to be at all. What with Matt cornin’ along to 
see the furriner just when he did and callin’ to him, 
and him startin’ off like a rabbit and Matt gettin’ 
his suspicions up and startin’ after him and him 
beginnin’ to run, that way.” 



162 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


“But why was he there on the trail. Granny?” 
Harriet asked in a low voice. 

“He got plumb mixed up, that’s why,” Granny re' 
plied. “He was tryin’ to beat Matt to the mine but 
he took the wrong trail. And Matt got to hollerin’ 
and he thought Matt knowed what he was up to— 
about the dynamitin’, I mean—and he took to his 
heels. He’s a coward or he’d have known Matt 
couldn’t beat him up alone. Leastways, that’s how I 
figure it out from what Matt told me this morning. 
I’m thankful it turned out the way it did. Things 
might not have worked out the way they did at the 
mine if the furriner’d been there.” 

“It was due to you that things did work out. 
Granny,” Harriet said quickly. “You made us that 
speech. I’ll never forget it, and nobody else will that 
heard it.” 

“Oh,” Nancy cried, “I wish that I could have been 
there. I wasn’t with you at the mine and I wasn’t 
with the boys when they—” 

“Hush!” cried Harriet, nodding her head toward 
the open door. 

Nancy left her wail unfinished, but her disappoint' 
ment could be read in the expression on her face. 



The Day After 


163 


“Never mind,” consoled her sister, “you may have 
missed a lot of excitement, but you escaped a lot of 
worry and trouble, too. For awhile we didn’t know 
just what was going to happen. I thought of the 
rest of you at home and was glad that you were safe.” 

Nancy sniffed slightly. “And we weren’t so safe 
after all—just Billy Boy, the twins and I,” she re' 
minded Harriet. 

Her voice held so self'pitying a note that Harriet 
reached over and gave her a comforting pat. 

“Never mind, Nancy,” she said. “No telling what 
may turn up yet.” 

Nancy looked a bit more hopeful. 

“There’s always something turning up,” she ad' 
mitted. “I don’t think I ever read a story half as 
interesting as the life we have lived since we came 
to Thunderhead. I wonder what will happen next.” 

Just then Granny made a sudden movement and 
spilled a mess of pea hulls from her apron. As Har' 
riet and Nancy scrambled to gather them up, the 
older sister felt a quick spasm of contriteness. Nancy 
had been talking as though all the trouble was over! 
Perhaps Granny’s eyes had filled with tears and that 
was why she had spilled the hulls. 



164 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


Harriet dropped her handfuls of hulls into the 
apron and leaned over to kiss Granny on the fore' 
head. “Nancy hasn’t forgotten about Uncle Matt,” 
she said quietly. “It’s just that we both are so 
happy about the mine’s not getting dynamited.” 

Granny straightened her shoulders and smiled up 
at the girl bending above her. ‘That’s all right, 
honey. Take one trouble at a time and when one’s 
over and behind, face the next one.” 

Grasping her apron with one hand. Granny then 
held out the pan of peas with the other. “Put these 
in the pot, Harriet,” she said briskly. “And you, 
Nancy, mend that fire right away. I’ve got to get 
the bread on for dinner. There’ll be a passel o’ hungry 
folks here in a little while and no mistake.” 

But she interrupted her plans for dinner to glance 
out at her patient. 

“He’s got his eyes shut,” she reported, “but I don’t 
believe he’s asleep for his breath comes too short 
and quick. We must be careful,” she added in a low 
voice, “what we say in earshot o’ him. No tellin’ 
how long he’ll stay here with us, and we’ll just be 
obliged to get used to him. We must treat him man* 
nerly, too. It’s the only way to do.” 



The Day After 


165 


“Yes, Granny,” agreed Harriet, but she was think' 
ing how hard it would be for everybody to be man' 
nerly to Mr. Jones. This would be like being polite 
to a shoe that hurt your corns when you walked in it. 

Uncle Matt and the boys entertained the family 
throughout dinner with an enthusiastic report of 
the work on the Orchard Hill home'place. 

“As soon as we get in the windows, we can move 
in,” Dick declared. “Oh, there’s a lot more to be 
done, little things inside and out, but they can be 
done mostly after we move and are settled down. 
We’ll have to build new steps soon, clean up around 
the cabin, and put up a fence.” 

“I can nail on the palings, I guess,” said John. “See, 
I’m growing a muscle,” and he rolled up a shirt 
sleeve. 

“So am I,” declared Joan, displaying one to match 
her twin’s. 

“I can hammer!” announced Billy Boy with a pride' 
rul air. “I did it this morning. I drove a nail,” he 
boasted, then paused to look about the table. 

“What you all laugh for?” he demanded. 

Bob slapped him on the back. “We’re proud of 
you, Billy Boy! You can work and no mistake!” 



166 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


“Well, I’m glad to hear that.” And Uncle Matt 
looked across at him. “Maybe now I can get you 
to help me drive to town this afternoon.” 

Billy Boy squealed with delight. 

“Humph!” remarked Granny. “You’ll have that 
young ’un spiled plumb to death until his folks won’t 
own him when they see him again.” 

“When are they coming?” Aunt Lissie looked up 
at Harriet. 

“Soon, I hope, real soon,” was the reply. “There’s 
no time set. They’ll come when we have the cabin 
ready for them.” 

“That won’t be long. You write and tell ’em to 
come right on, if they want to.” This from Uncle 
Matt. “We’ll be ready in a few days, anyway.” 

It was a cheerful scene in the kitchen. But it was 
one that for all its pleasant air seemed a little forced, 
as though it had stepped out of a play with rather 
self'Conscious actors speaking brightly and a bit too 
loudly to keep up their courage. 

Out in the dogtrot, propped up on his pallet bed 
with his ever-present coat behind his head, Mr. Jones 
ate his generous dinner in solitude. Several times 
during the meal Granny or Aunt Lissie went out to 



The Day After 


167 


inquire about his wants or replenish his plate for him. 

“We must be mannerly,” Granny kept repeating as 
she set an example which maintained her own inter¬ 
pretation of good conduct. 

In the afternoon after the boys had departed for 
the cabin, some callers came, as if by happenstance, 
to see Mr. Jones. Granny received them all cordially. 
Catching up her knitting she sat down in the dogtrot 
with them. Aunt Lissie was there, too, with some 
mending. Near her Harriet and Nancy sorted out 
the week’s stockings. 

Last among the callers were Buck Coomer and his 
father. 

“Heard you got hurt and thought I’d drop by to 
see how you are coming along,” Mr. Coomer said 
with an embarrassed air as he sat down in the chair 
Granny pushed forward for him. It had been many 
a year since he had come to this cabin. 

Mr. Jones did not reply. 

Mr. Coomer cleared his throat and began again. 
“Too bad about your accident.” Beside him, Buck 
frowned at the injured man. 

Still Mr. Jones said nothing. 

Again Mr. Coomer cleared his throat. “Too bad 



168 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


you started for the mine atter sundown. It’s hard 
to go a certain direction in these mountains after 
sunset,” he went on. Then, suddenly leaning for' 
ward, he looked into Mr. Jones’s face with eyes that 
seemed to drill through him. 

“I guess you know what I’ve come for,” he said 
angrily. 

Mr. Jones’ face flushed red under its pallor, and 
his face muscles twitched. 

“No, I don’t,” he retorted, and turned his face to 
the wall. 

Mr. Coomer rose from his chair then, and took 
a step toward the cot. Breathlessly, Harriet watched 
him. He looked exactly as though he were going 
to take hold of Mr. Jones and shake him soundly! 
Buck, too, was now standing up, his hands clenched. 

“Well,” exclaimed Granny cheerily, “I guess that’s 
about as much visitin’ as our invalid can stand at 
one stretch. There comes Matt, Mr. Coomer. How 
about our steppin’ out a way to greet him?” 

With a last angry glance at the back of Mr. Jones’ 
head, Mr. Coomer walked from the dogtrot with 
Granny. And Buck slipped to Harriet’s side, holding 
out a note. 




Mr, Coomcr took a ste P toward the cot 































The Day After 


rp. 

“It’s from Mary Ann,” he explained. “About 
school.” 

“Thank you, Buck,” Harriet smiled. 

Buck moved one bare foot up and down a crack 
of the dogtrot floor. “I’m coming to school Mon' 
day,” he stated, glancing up shyly. 

“Oh, Buck! I’m glad. I have lots of new plans, 
and we need another ball player, too. Gan you 
pitch?” 

Buck blushed. “Guess so. Used to could, any' 
how.” 

“That’s fine! Be sure to come early, won’t you? 
We always have one game before school takes up in 
the morning.” 

Buck nodded, then followed his father through the 
gate, arriving at his side just as Uncle Matt came driv' 
ing up with Billy Boy. 

“Howdy!” Uncle Matt cried cordially. “Left the 
windows at the cabin, folks. Every one’s as sound 
as a dollar. I reckon the boys’ll get them in come 
Monday, anyway.” 

“We’ve been to town,” Billy Boy shouted. 

Mr. Coomer nodded, then walked alongside of the 
wagon as it came up to the cabin. “Can you and 



172 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 



me have a talk, Matt?” he asked earnestly, but in so 
friendly a voice that Harriet felt no dismay. 

Uncle Matt glanced keenly down at his visitor, 
then jumped from the wagon and replied, “How 
about over there on that log?” 

Granny held out her arms for Billy Boy, and Buck 
climbed into the wagon to drive the horses around 
to the bam. 

“What do you suppose they’re talking about, Han 
riet?” Nancy asked, nodding toward the two men. 

“Whatever it is, Uncle Matt’s mighty interested,” 
replied Harriet. “Maybe he knows something that 
will help Uncle Matt out of his trouble.” 

“Don’t you girls go gettin’ your hopes up that-a' 
way,” commented Granny, at their elbow. “It’s a 



The Day After 


J73 


downright, sure-enough miracle to have the two of 
’em sittin’ there in peace, talkin’ like neighbors.” 

“But, Granny—” Harriet began, then stopped and 
walked toward the porch. Inside the cabin, she hur¬ 
riedly opened Mary Ann’s note: 

Dear Harriet: 

Pappy just told Buck and Buck told me that 
Pappy’s not got any more use for that Mr. Jones. I’m 
glad of it and I think Pappy’s going over to your place 
to tell him a thing or two, and it’s about something 
else besides the dynamiting. I don’t know just what 
it is but that Jones will soon have worse than a 
sprained ankle if some folks get a-hold of him. 
There’s talk around. 

Good-bye till Monday. 

Mary Ann 

Harriet looked up to encounter Nancy’s earnest 
gase. “It’s about our guest,” she explained, folding 
up the note. “And something, Mary Ann doesn’t 
know what, that is making folks awfully mad at him. 
Not just the dynamiting plan, I mean. I wonder—” 

“Are you going to write Mother and Father that 
they can come any time now?” Nancy asked eagerly. 

Harriet nodded. “Yes, and you’ll be on hand for 
that excitement, Nancy.” 

When Mr. Coomer and Buck had left, Uncle Matt 



174 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


walked slowly into the kitchen and motioned Granny 
and Aunt Lissie to come out to the bam. 

“Yes, you and Nancy can come, too, if you’ve a 
mind,” he said in response to Harriet’s pleading look. 

Inside the bam, Uncle Matt turned to them with 
a pusaled little frown. “It’s Jones,” he explained, 
“and more of his tricks. Seems he’s been gettin’ 
money from the men, promisin’ ’em they’ll more 
than get it back from their bigger pay. He had it 
all worked out, it seems. Like a drawing! First he 
got them to pay for his working things out, and 
they was to dynamite the mine. Then he was going 
to walk in and tell the mine owners what-for. Then 
the pay envelopes was goin’ to be bigger, right away 
and just like that. And now the men don’t believe 
it at all. They’re glad they didn’t do the dynamitin’, 
for a fact, Granny. And they want their money back. 
That’s what Coomer come here to see Jones for and 
Jones wouldn’t say a word, just flopped over onto 
his coat. But Coomer’s coming back and he asked 
me was I goin’ to keep a watch on him so that he 
won’t get away with that money. Coomer thinks 
he has it on him. In his coat, maybe.” 

Harriet spoke up quickly. “Oh, no, Uncle Matt. 



The Day After 


J75 


Dick looked in his coat. There wasn’t anything in 
the pockets at all.” 

“What’s that? Dick searched his coat? Why?” 

“Well,” replied Harriet, reluctantly, “you know 
how he and Bob have been looking for a clue. 
They’ve had the idea that Mr. Jones used that hook 
to get the bag and Dick was hunting for the money 
in his coat.” 

Slowly Uncle Matt shook his head. “I wish ’twas 
as simple as that, child. I only wish it was. Where 
that mail money’s gone maybe never will be clear. 
And—” 

“—and right now Coomer needn’t be worrying 
about that guest of ours,” said Granny decidedly. 
“He’s a sick man and he won’t be starting off yet 
while. I’ve been nurse to more than one as banged 
up as he is, and I know a thing or two about ’em. 
Just you all go on treating him mannerly, and the 
men can get their money from him in due course. 
What have they decided about going back to work, 
Matt?” 

Uncle Matt smiled. “They’re going back, all right. 
And I said to Coomer if they think they should have 
more pay, why don’t they get three or four of ’em 




176 _ The Mail Wagon Mystery 

to have a good talk with the foreman? And Coomer, 
he said we should have a committee and he said 
Granny Murray had ought to be on it.” 

For answer, Granny hurried toward the bam door. 
“That’s real nice, I’m sure,” she called over her shoub 
der. “But the kitchen’s my place, I'm thinkin’ and 
I’m on my way there now!” 





Chapter XV 

ANOTHER RUNAWAY 


There was a different spirit in the school the fol¬ 
lowing Monday, which manifested itself as soon as 
Harriet walked through the door. She was always 
sensitive to subtle changes in the attitude of those 
about her, and was now aware at once that she was 
surrounded by a happier atmosphere. 

For one thing, she found herself being regarded 
with admiration and even awe by all the children. 
For another, gifts of fruit — apples, grapes and 
peaches—were heaped upon her table-desk. 

“I can’t imagine why they are doing this!” she 


i77 


178 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


exclaimed to Mary Ann Coomer who lingered near. 
“Are these gifts peace offerings for mischief mak¬ 
ing?” 

“No, I reckon not,” said Mary Ann, “but you 
might call ’em good will offerings, I guess, or thank 
offerings, maybe, sort o’ like the kind the people 
gave back in Bible times.” 

But Harriet was still perplexed. “I can’t riddle it 
out at all, as Granny Murray would say,” she said, 
trying to read the mystery behind Mary Ann’s ex¬ 
pression, and failing utterly to do so. 

Mary Ann’s lips curved into a grin, then her face 
sobered a little. 

“It was your Granny that saved Middle Mine from 
being dynamited, and you helped her. Everybody’s 
glad the dynamiting didn’t happen.” 

“Oh,” said Harriet, “I didn’t do a thing. The men 
have all the women to thank for saving them from 
that foolishness. But I’m glad Granny’s plan worked. 
I don’t mind saying to you though, Mary Ann, that 
I was all a-tremble with pure fright for a little while. 
It was Granny’s speech that saved me from heart fail¬ 
ure. Wasn’t she just splendid!” 

“Yes,” agreed Mary Ann, “I’ll never forget her 



Another Runaway 


179 


standing there and talking to all that crowd in front 
of her. She wasn’t a bit afraid, or if she was she 
didn’t show it. I heard my pappy and mammy talk' 
ing about it afterwards and Pappy laughed and said 
nobody could make a better speech than that, not 
even the Circuit Rider!” 

“I’ll have to tell Granny that. Just the other day 
she was saying she lacked ‘the gift of gab’ possessed 
by some people. She was talking about that Jones 
and the way he can get folks to do things in spite of 
their own reason. But that’s over now.” 

“How long is he going to stay at your house?” 
asked Mary Ann. “It does seem sort o’ funny his 
harboring under the very roof of the folks he plotted 
against. Everyone knows he started the story that 
your Uncle Matt stole the mail money.” 

“He did?” exclaimed Harriet. “I hadn’t heard 
that!” Then in a moment, she continued, “But we 
couldn’t refuse him shelter, not now that he is crip' 
pled, could we?” 

“I guess not,” Mary Ann admitted rather reluc' 
tantly. “How long will he be there?” 

“Another week—maybe longer. He was whittling 
on a crutch this morning,” said Harriet, “but I don’t 



i8o 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


suppose he can use it for a good while. Granny 
dresses his foot twice every day.” 

Buck poked his head in at the open door. “Come 
on and play ball!” he shouted, then vanished. 

Harriet looked at the watch. “It’s nearly time to 
take up school, but I guess an extra quarter of an 
hour won’t hurt. It’s a celebration, really, of Buck’s 
coming to school today.” 

“He took a notion,” Mary Ann said, by way of 
explanation for Buck’s sudden conversion to educa- 
tion. Harriet nodded. Everyone was glad to have 
Buck come. He was a good ball player, and no mis- 
take. 

But Buck’s return meant far more than that, Har¬ 
riet thought. It was one more step in wiping out 
the Murray-Coomer feud. How happy her father 
and mother would be to come back and find Thun- 
derhead Mountain a place of friendliness! 

For a moment, she thought happily of the little 
cabin among the apple trees. Then quickly elation 
gave way to depression. Uncle Matt must still face 
a court trial. The miners’ money had not been dis¬ 
covered. The robber had not been found. 

All through that day at school, these thoughts re- 



Another^ Runaway 


181 


curred. When going home that afternoon, she met 
Squire Caudil, she asked anxiously, ‘'''They can’t 
prove that Uncle Matt took that money. And you 
know he didn’t.” 

“Yes, I do know he didn’t,” Squire Caudil an' 
swered gravely. “But I’m not the jury, and I’m not 
the judge. They’re the ones who’ll decide. That’s all 
I can say. What I hope is another matter.” 

At home, Harriet found a letter from her father. 
“Oh, Granny,” she cried, when she had read the 
first paragraph—and there was a catch in her voice. 
“They can’t come yet. The doctor says Mother 
should get more strength back before they try the 
trip. She has had a setback.” And her lips quivered. 

“Now, now, child, don’t you take it so to heart. 
Their not cornin’ right now’ll give you all that much 
more time to do some of the things you’re countin’ 
on. And when they do get here, they’ll be right at 
home. Besides—” But Granny did not complete 
her sentence. And Harriet, hurrying out to tell the 
others of the Murray Six, did not ask what she had 
in mind. For she knew. “Besides, maybe things will 
work out for Matt by that time,” Granny had meant 
to say. Poor Granny! 



182 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


As the days passed, it became more and more evh 
dent that even Mr. Jones’s strongest supporters had 
turned against him. The men returned to work in 
the mine, appointing a committee as Uncle Matt had 
suggested. And the foreman had been quite frank in 
giving them a picture of the actual condition of the 
mine. He had even shown them the books—and 
from the figures the men had been convinced of the 
owners’ fairness. 

Uncle Matt continued his work as watchman with 
no ugly insinuations being cast upon his innocence. 
If it had not been for the court trial, Granny and 
her family would have been entirely happy in their 
anticipation of the coming arrival of the parents of 
the Murray Six. 

Every now and then, some of Mr. Jones’s former 
admirers appeared and tried to get from him informa' 
tion as to the whereabouts of the money they had 
paid him. But to every question, Mr. Jones replied 
only with a sulky silence. When some of the men 
suggested more strenuous measures to extract the de* 
sired answers, Granny took a firm hand. 

“That you will not do,” she declared. “You’ve got 
to treat invalids mannerly—’specially guests.” 



Another Runaway 


183 


As the day for Uncle Matt's trial came ever closer, 
however, it seemed to Harriet that Granny’s insist' 
ence upon mannerliness sounded half-hearted. In¬ 
deed, all the family were now feeling the strain. 
Nerves got jumpy, patience grew thin. To make mat¬ 
ters worse, the Murray Six had no definite date ahead 
for their parents’ arrival. If only they could have 
known when Mother and Father would be there, 
Harriet felt sure they would be helped tremendously. 
But an increasing sense of dread was with them all. 

Only Billy Boy and John and Joan went their way 
with any degree of lightheartedness. To the twins, 
the visitor was merely the central figure in a new 
game. They called their game Booger Man. When 
Mr. Jones was asleep on the porch, they would slip 
up, touch his shadow, then dash to Home before he 
could wake up and run after them. If he had ever 
really wakened while this game was in progress, even 
the twins had no idea of what they would have 
done. Unaware of his role, however, Mr. Jones did 
not stir inopportunely and the game went on. 

One afternoon while Harriet was helping get sup¬ 
per in the kitchen, Joan and John came slipping 
through the door. 



184 


The Mail Wagon Mystery^ 


“Come see what we got this time, Harriet. The 
Booger Man’s pillow. His head rolled off and—•” 

“And he was snoring so loud he didn’t hear us!” 
finished Joan, bursting into a giggle, as she pointed 
at the bundle John had tucked under his arm. 

Harriet, sifting meal to make com pone for sup- 
per, barely looked up. “He’ll catch you at your tricks 
some time before long, and then—” 

“Then the Booger Man will carry us off and shut 
us up in his dungeon, and you’ll have to come and 
rescue us,” Joan said. 

“Humph! Harriet isn’t a knight,” scoffed John. 
“She’s nothing but a school teacher, and teachers 
don’t ride around rescuing folks.” 

“I’m awfully sorry,” Harriet laughed, as she sifted 
diligently away, “if you think I won’t do, but maybe 
if you were in a dungeon and feeling lonesome as 
well as scared, you might be willing to let me rescue 
you.” 

John looked doubtful, but Joan said, “You could 
rescue me from the dungeon, and John could just 
stay on till his knight came riding by.” 

“Maybe I could rescue myself,” said John. 

“Maybe you couldn’t,” said his twin. 



Another^ Runaway 


I §5 


The twins’ dispute ended in a chase for Billy Boy, 
rushing up, snatched the bundle away and ran out 
into the yard. 

A few minutes later, Mr. Jones gave a loud groan 
that resembled a roar. Granny left the comer cup¬ 
board where she had been sorting the dishes, crossed 
to the open door and very kindly said, “Are you in 
misery, Mr. Jones? What seems to ail you?” 

Another groan was the only reply. Granny hur¬ 
ried to his side. Mr. Jones was now holding his head 
in his hands and shaking as if he had the ague. 

“He’s had a relapse, I reckon,” cried Granny, lay¬ 
ing a firm hand on the quaking shoulder. “Better lie 
back on your bed, Mr. Jones.” 

“My coat—my coat!” Mr. Jones moaned, shaking 
off her hand. 

“What you need is a blanket,” said Granny, “and 
a hot rock at your feet. I’ll tend to you in no time.” 

For answer, Mr. Jones struggled to his feet, using 
his crutch to support himself. 

“Where is my coat, my coat?” he demanded. “It 
was here, and now it is gone!” 

“Never mind, never mind,” Granny replied, sooth¬ 
ingly. “It’s around somewhere, I reckon. I’ll get you 



i86 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


a bed blanket, then I’ll look for it.” And she van- 
ished in the direction of the big bedroom. 

Mr. Jones hobbled to the kitchen door. “Where’s 
my coat?” he demanded fiercely of Harriet who 
jumped in startled surprise at his words. 

“Your coat, Mr. Jones? I don’t know anything 
about it. Maybe somebody hung it up. I’ll look for 
it as soon as I get the bread on.” 

Mr. Jones hobbled back to his pallet. And Har' 
riet, washing her hands quickly, paused at the kitchen 
door to consider the problem. 

At that minute Billy Boy ran pelbmell through the 
yard, the twins after him. “I got the Booger Man’s 
pillow,” he cried, hugging a bundle closely. 

Harriet took one glance at it, saw, and understood. 
The pillow was Mr. Jones’ old coat, rolled into a 
rectangular bundle and tied with a knot in the sleeves. 
It was what the twins had been talking about when 
they came through the kitchen. 

“Come here, Billy Boy,” she said. “That’s Mr. 
Jones’s coat. You must give it back to him. No, wait. 
You twins ought to do that.” 

“All right,” they both said, and off they went, the 
coat dangling between them. 




Billy Boy ran pell-mell through the yard 




























Another^ Runaway 


189 


“Here, Mr. Jones, here’s your coat,” they shouted. 
Then they dashed away leaving the coat on a chair 
near the invalid, as if fearful to approach within 
reaching distance of the dark man who sat hunched 
up on his pallet bed, trying to resist Granny’s gentle 
yet firm ministrations. 

“Here, let me fold this blanket around you, and 
you drink this hot tea,” Granny said. “It’ll chase the 
chill right out o’ your bones.” 

Mr. Jones paid no attention to her. Reaching out, 
he pulled the coat over to his pallet and bundled it 
under his head. 

“Leave me in peace,” he muttered ungratefully. 
And Granny, at the end of all patience, cried, “I 
think you must be possessed. I never saw such a 
cross-grained man.” 

She was stamping angrily as she returned to the 
kitchen. “The next time he groans, I vow I’ll be in 
no hurry to hasten to him. Be good to your enemies. 
That’s what the Good Book says, but I leave it all 
to the angels above if I’ve not done more than my 
duty. I’d as soon doctor Satan himself as to do any¬ 
thing with that man! Harriet, the bread’s bumin’— 
don’t you smell it? Harriet! Where are you?” 



The Mail Wagon Mystery 


190 

But Harriet was gone. And Granny, still in the 
grip of hot indignation, crossed to the stove and her' 
self attended to the bread. Had she gone to the back 
door, she would have seen her oldest granddaughter 
gazing in amazement at a ten'dollar bill. 

After the scramble to return the coat, Harriet had 
noticed something lying on the kitchen floor. When, 
stooping to pick it up, she had seen that it was a 
ten'dollar bill, her hands had trembled and her breath 
had come fast at the thought that came rushing to 
her mind. This money must have dropped from the 
coat while the children were playing. None of the 
family had that much! What if Dick had been right 
all along, and Mr. Jones was the thief, after all? 

Almost blindly, she had hurried outside to be 
alone. And her hands trembled as she carefully ex' 
amined the bill. Yes, it was real. Then her forehead 
wrinkled as she tried to recall just what Dick had 
done that night when he examined the pockets of 
Mr. Jones’s coat. Had he really looked in every one? 
He had been in such a hurry, surely he might easily 
have overlooked one on the inside. 

Yes, that was what must have happened. And 
because the money was still there, Mr. Jones had 




Another Runaway 


191 

kept his coat under his head, for a pillow. Of course! 
He was the one who had taken the mail money. All 
they need do now was to get the coat and—she was 
just about to rush inside and tell Granny the good 
news, when another thought held her back. 

Was she sure this was the mine money? Mr. 
Coomer and the others had been coming to see about 
what they had paid over to Mr. Jones. They had 
never said just how much they had given him, but 
it must have been more than ten dollars. In which 
case, this bill could just as well be the men’s, and 
not the mine money at all. 

From inside the kitchen came the sound of Gran¬ 
ny’s movements as she went on with the supper 
preparations. Poor Granny! It would be cruel even 
to suggest to her this possibility of clearing Uncle 
Matt, when it might so easily prove only a false hope. 

“Harriet! Nan—cee! Harriet!” 

It was the twins, shouting of some discovery just 
made out by the bam. Quickly Harriet thrust the 
bill into her apron pocket, the crisp bill that mocked 
her with its subtle hint of hope. 

“Harriet!” Now it was Granny calling. 

“Yes, Granny!” Harriet replied. “I’m coming!” 



192 


The MaU Wagon Mystery 


But before she returned to the kitchen, she paused 
to remove the bill from her apron pocket, fold it, 
and thrust it hastily down, into the top of her shoe. 

By the time she was once more at Granny’s side, 
she had made up her mind what to do. She would 
say nothing to anyone until she had managed to get 
hold of Mr. Jones’s coat again, and examine it mi' 
nutely. If she told anyone, something might be said 
that would arouse Mr. Jones’s suspicions. Then there 
was no telling what he would do with the money— 
hide it somewhere perhaps, for he was hobbling 
about fairly well now. That is, he might hide it if 
there were any there to hide. Again and again, Har' 
riet’s thoughts returned to the realization that the 
ten dollars in the top of her shoe might be all there 
was. . . . 

Granny was lighting a pine stick on the hearth. 
“Even in midsummer,” she said, “seems like there’s 
a chill comes creeping along with the shadows. ’Tis 
lonesome unless you have a light kindled on the 
hearth then. It’s pretmigh time for supper. Go out 
into the porch, Harriet, and whoop everybody up.” 

Throughout that meal Harriet strove to present a 
casual manner, to betray no hint of the agitation that 



Another Runaway 


193 


stirred the recesses of her mind. It was hard to keep 
her eyes from Mr. Jones’s face, at the end of the table, 
for he was now able to come there with the aid of 
his crutch. Mealtime was always difficult, with him 
among them. Uncle Matt had ideas of duty to which 
he sternly bound himself with relentless chains. But 
neither manners nor morals compelled him to carry 
on a conversation with this person whom ironical 
chance had made his enemy-guest. 

Aunt Lissie had become so nervous she could 
scarcely hold a spoonful of food without spilling it 
four different ways. And tonight even Granny 
seemed depressed, or perhaps, Harriet thought, she 
was outraged by her failure to administer to her 
patient. At any rate, she paid attention to her plate 
and very little else. 

No one made any comment when Harriet slipped 
away from her place at the table and disappeared 
into the darkness without. Nor did anyone question 
her when after a prolonged absence, she returned. 
Bob and Dick were talking in low tones on their side 
of the table and Nancy was shamelessly eavesdrop- 
ping. Only Billy Boy greeted her. 

“More molasses, Harriet, please,” he said. 



194 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


Harriet sat down at her place at the table, and 
glanced at Mr. Jones. He had eaten very little, seem' 
ing to be feasting mainly on his thoughts. Their 
flavor was not altogether savory, judging from his 
dour expression. Shortly after Harriet reappeared, 
he got up and hobbled away. In silence, the family 
listened as he thumped about in the dogtrot. Then 
the thud of his crutch stick sounded no more. 

“Bad man’s gone,” observed Billy Boy. “Please, 
may I have more molasses?” 

Harriet took his plate and tilted the old blue 
pitcher to pour a little trickle of brown sweetness on 
a piece of combread. Billy Boy’s bread and molasses 
rarely gave out together, a circumstance due, Harriet 
suspected, to her small brother’s clever management. 

At length Aunt Lissie rose and said, “I better shut 
up the chickens. Some varmint got into the bam 
roost last night and this morning a pullet was gone.” 

Harriet was washing Billy Boy’s face, the twins 
were getting ready for another game, Dick and Bob 
were considering what to do next and Nancy was 
starting to help Granny with the supper dishes when 
Aunt Lissie rushed back. “Did you boys turn Dock 
into the pasture?” she asked breathlessly. 



Another^ Runaway 


195 


“No!” cried the boys together. 

“He’s not in the little lot,” Aunt Lissie said, “and 
he’s not about the bam. He must have broken out.” 

Uncle Matt and the boys jumped up from the table 
and dashed outside. When they came back, Uncle 
Matt was shaking with anger, but Dick and Bob an¬ 
nounced the news: 

“Dock—and Mr. Jones—both gone!” 

“The varmint,” muttered Uncle Matt, “and with 
the men’s money, too.” 

Harriet pushed past him, into the darkness. When 
she returned, over her arm was Mr. Jones’s old coat. 




Chapter XVI 

HOME ON ORCHARD HILL 

A chorus of exclamations greeted the sight. 

“I played a trick on him,” Harriet began quickly, 
“and it may all be to no purpose, so don’t build up 
your expectations. It’s just an idea I had, and it 
may not come to a thing.” 

Another chorus fell upon her ears. 

“But why!” 

“When—” 

“What made you do it—swipe that old coat?” 
this from Dick. 

For answer, Harriet stepped closer to the kerosene 
196 




Home on Orchard Hill 


197 


lamp on the kitchen table, the coat grasped firmly 
in her hands. The others pressed about her, anxiously 
following every move. 

Rip—rip—and the lining admitted Harriet’s eager 
right hand. “Yes, I do feel something,” she said, 
feeling carefully about. Then, “Look!” and she drew 
out a handful of loose greenbacks and laid them on 
the table. 

With startled exclamations, the rest of the family 
bent over the money. Wonderingly Uncle Matt 
picked it up and counted it. “Twenty'five dollars,” 
he said. “It’s the money the men paid him for the 
strike, I reckon.” 

“There is more here too, I think,” Harriet went 
on, bending over the coat. “I feel it. The whole 
inside is lined with something tacked here and there.” 

Her quick fingers broke threads with a series of 
snaps that sounded loud in the intense silence which 
now fell upon the kitchen. 

“There!” Harriet drew forth her hand once more 
to show them a ten-dollar bill. 

It was too much. Dropping the money, Harriet 
sank down in a chair and gave a half'hysterical gig' 
gle. “Why, I must be dreaming,” she said weakly. 



198 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


“It’s the money—the miners’ money all right,” 
muttered Uncle Matt, smoothing out the green bills 
on the table. 

Ever since Harriet had produced the first handfuls 
of bills. Granny had seemed in a dase. Now, how* 
ever, she sprang into action. “Give me that coat!” 
she cried. “I’m thinking the mine money’s there 
with the rest of it.” 

Rip—snip—rip! It was only a matter of moments 
before Granny triumphantly added a goodly number 
of bills to those already on the table. With exulting 
count, Dick and Bob declaimed the total. Granny 
was right. Without doubt, it was not only the mine 
money but what the miners had paid to Mr. Jones. 

Thick and fast came the family’s questions then. 
How had Harriet happened to think of looking there 
for the money? How had she managed to get hold 
of Mr. Jones’s old coat? Had she known he was 
planning to go off? Why hadn’t he missed his coat? 

“Heaps o’ money,” exclaimed Billy Boy during a 
slight pause in the barrage of questioning. 

Harriet smiled at her small brother and, bending 
over, took from the top of her shoe another ten- 
dollar bill. 




Granny triumphantly added a goodly number of bills 


























Home on Orchard Hill 


201 


“The clue to the mystery,” she told them with a 
little flourish. 

Interruptions started again but Harriet held up her 
hand. “I’ll tell you everything just as it happened, 
if you’ll let me begin at the beginning,” she said. 

“Go on, honey. That’s right. Don’t a-one of you- 
all interrupt her now till she gets through—not a 
one!” cried Granny in a severe tone, her black eyes 
snapping about the circle of faces from Uncle Matt 
to Billy Boy. Then she turned to Harriet. “Wag on 
with your tale, child.” And she raised her walking 
stick to give it a thump upon the floor. “I’ll keep 
’em in line.” 

The circle around the table stood mute, and Har¬ 
riet began. “It won’t take long,” she said, “but be¬ 
fore I begin on what happened, I want to say I’m 
sorry I ever laughed at Dick and Bob and their clues, 
because they were right all along. Mr. Jones did take 
the mine money just the way they figured out.” 

In pleased embarrassment at being thus included in 
the glory of the moment, her brother and cousin 
grinned at her. But before Granny’s intent eyes, they 
remained silent, waiting for Harriet’s revelations. 

“When Dick looked through the pockets of the 



202 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


coat that night, nobody would even have thought 
any money was in it,” Harriet continued. “In fact, 
if it hadn’t been for the twins and their Booger Man 
game, we never would have known. I guess you’ve 
all seen John and Joan play that Booger Man game, 
slipping up on Mr. Jones when he was asleep and 
trying to touch his shadow or—” 

“Or his foot,” cried John. 

“And his hair sometimes,” added Joan. 

Granny frowned fiercely in their direction and 
reaching out her stick, prodded them into silence. 

“Well,” went on Harriet, “just before supper they 
had a new idea. They managed to get hold of his 
coat that he had been using for a pillow and—” 

“But his head had slipped off, Harriet,” explained 
John. 

Harriet nodded. “Yes, his head had slipped off 
and you snatched up the coat and ran off with it.” 

“Then Billy Boy grabbed it and we didn’t want 
him to have it,” Joan put in. 

“And that is how it got tom so that a temdollar 
bill dropped out onto the kitchen floor. I was so 
busy with supper, I didn’t notice what they were 
scuffling over, to tell you the truth. The twins kept 



Home on Orchard Hill 


203 


saying it was a bundle. So when they ran outdoors 
with it, I didn’t think anything about it, one way or 
another. Then when Granny was out with Mr. 
Jones, I found the bill. And what with his shouting 
around about his coat being gone, I realized that was 
what the children had and this money must have 
dropped out of it. 

“You know how he wouldn’t let the coat out of 
his sight? We’d wondered why, so right away I 
thought this money must have been in a secret hid' 
ing place in it all along.’’ 

“The ilhtumed wretch!” cried Granny. 

Billy Boy bent a reproving eye upon his grand' 
mother. “Mustn’t interrupt, Granny!” he said. 

Everyone laughed at that, then all once more 
turned toward Harriet. 

“Well,” went on Harriet, “the idea of its having 
been inside the lining popped into my head. I was 
just going to tell Granny about it when I remem' 
bered how worried she’d been about Uncle Matt and 
how disappointed she’d be if the ten dollars I d found 
was all there was. And it might have been, you 
know. So I stuck the bill into my shoe and made up 
my mind to get that coat some way and find out. 



204 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


“While we were eating supper, and Mr. Jones was 
acting even more queer than usual, all of a sudden I 
noticed he didn’t have his coat on. And I thought 
then and there I’d better go out and look. I couldn’t 
find it at first—it was all rolled up and under the 
bottom of the pallet. I guess he didn’t want to wear 
it in to supper for fear Granny would want to mend 
the tear, and he didn’t want her poking into it. Any- 
way, by that time I was afraid he’d be coming out, 
so I grabbed up that old coat of Uncle Matt’s that’s 
always hanging outside and rolled it up the same 
way he did his when he used it as a pillow. Then 
I put it under the pallet and took his coat out back. 
I didn’t have any idea he’d be running off, the way 
he did. I just thought he’d lie down without making 
a light, as he always has, you know, and wouldn’t 
miss his own coat until I’d had time to search it. But 
you know all the rest!” she cried, ending abruptly. 

It was Dick who spoke first. “I’d like to see that 
fellow,” he said, “when he takes time to look at Uncle 
Matt’s coat!” 

“So would I!” Bob shouted. “And I'll bet he sets 
the air afire for a mile around with the words he’ll 
have to say.” 



Home on Orchard Hill 


205 


Nancy shivered. “I’m glad he’s gone. Living with 
him under our roof was dreadful. Why anything, 
anything could have happened. He could have killed 
us all in our beds.” 

“Killed us all dead!” echoed Billy Boy. 

Harriet shook her head at Nancy. “No—no, 
we’re safe, all safe, especially good little boys,” she 
said, realising that Billy Boy was much too excited. 

Granny roused herself from her silent reflections. 
“The Lord looks after us,” she said, and to Billy Boy 
and the twins, “Come along now, all you young 'uns. 
It’s time to turn in.” 

When they were gone Harriet said, “I’m sorry 
about your coat, Uncle Matt. I just had to use it.” 

“You say something to me?” he asked, lifting his 
head from long contemplation of the treasure spread 
out upon the table. His eyes blinked in the lamplight. 
“Did you speak to me, some of you?” 

“Never mind,” Harriet said, and she made a mo¬ 
tion to the rest. Uncle Matt must be left without 
interruption for a little while to think about the good 
fortune that had come to him. 

Harriet followed a winding trail through the apple 
orchard, writing materials tucked under her arm. She 



206 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


was seeking her favorite tree—a gnarled old giant 
whose canopy of twisted and interlaced branches 
bent over like a giant umbrella, a sun-proof tent 
which made an ideal retreat for her rare escapes from 
the activity at the cabin. 

Orchard Hill was a lovely place, this Saturday 
morning in early October. The air was redolent with 
the fragrance of ripe and mellow fruit. The brown- 
ing grass had the scent of hay. Along the creek in 
the valley, sycamores were yellowing, and the spur 
of the mountain beyond spread out bright banners 
of sassafras gold and the royal scarlet of sumac. It 
was a lovely time, Harriet thought, for a welcome 
home, as Granny Murray called the coming of Father 
and Mother. 

Spreading a sheet of paper on her knee, she began 
her letter to them. After the greeting she paused. 
Her last letter before their homecoming! Yes, and 
it must be a nice letter—a good letter, full of happy 
description. She would make a word picture for them 
of the house on Orchard Hill. She would tell how 
it had been finished and furnished, till at last it was 
ready to be a real home for them. They would like 
to hear how the neighbors and kin had lent kind 



Home on Orchard Hill 


207 


hands to the labor so that the homecoming would 
be hastened. She would tell how this and that one 
had brought gifts for the house; things of prided 
possession. “Nothing’s too good for our own folks 
that are coming back to us,” Mary Ann’s mother 
had said when she brought over this very morning 
a coverlet bright as a flower bed, in the Rainbow 
Ring pattern, pieced years ago. Some of the patches 
in it were even cut from dress scraps Harriet’s 
mother had given Mary Ann’s mother one day, long 
ago. 

Squire Caudil had given a rocking chair which had 
belonged to his mother. “I’m getting a little too hefty 
to risk myself in it,” he had said. “Just a bout the 
right size for a small woman person, ’bout like your 
mammy, I guess.” 

Mother would appreciate that, though it would 
be a great wonder if she didn’t get a bit hefty herself 
if she ate one half of the good things that Granny 
and Aunt Lissie were planning to feed her—chicken 
and dewberry jelly, the salt rising rolls and fresh milk, 
and dozens of other things. 

The letter grew from one page to ten. The morn¬ 
ing sun crept over the hill and seemed to halt for a 



208 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


while above Harriet’s apple tree, poking a long yel- 
low finger down through the rustling branches, as 
if he were curious to read for himself the pages that 
slipped from her knee. 

She had better close, thought Harriet, or she would 
not be able to get it all folded properly into an en- 
velope. 

Yes, she must stop—she couldn’t tell everything 
in a letter. Then, too, so much had happened this 
past week that she hadn’t even mentioned—all this 
she had left out on purpose. Later on Father and 
Mother would hear all about the trouble on Thun- 
derhead. How wonderful that it was over before 
Father and Mother came home! 

Perhaps she could go on teaching school here, saw 
ing her money to educate herself better. She could 
attend the spring and summer terms at the state uni¬ 
versity. Then she could help the other children later 
when they outgrew the little mountain school. Per¬ 
haps the Murrays could all make a real home here on 
Thunderhead Mountain among their own people. 
Father’s services were needed too, as a minister and 
friend. Harriet realized that he would feel the change 
in the people now. He would surely be welcomed 



Home on Orchard Hill 


209 


and wanted, now that all the trouble was over. 

For it was over. Mr. Jones had been caught by 
officers who had been looking for him for a long 
time. Squire Caudil had brought along the Nashville 
newspaper that described his capture. It seemed that 
Jones was only one of several names under which he 
had lived for the past ten years. And wherever he 
had gone, during all those years, trouble had fob 
lowed. 

He would always seem like an ogre to the folk on 
Thunderhead Mountain, Harriet thought. Legends 
would grow up about him no doubt, in the years to 
come, and when the twins and Billy Boy were grown 
up they would remember with mild shudders their 
dark guest whom they called the Booger Man. 

“Harriet. O—oh, Harriet!” It was Nancy. 

“Coming!” Harriet called and got to her feet. 

“Harriet—quick!” 

Was Nancy in trouble? Harriet ran up the path. 

“What—what—is it?” she managed to say as she 
opened the gate and left it swinging. 

“I can’t find the flavoring,” Nancy called. “I’m 
making an apple pie.” 

Harriet laughed with relief. “There isn’t any, I 



210 


The Mail Wagon Mystery 


guess,” she said, coming into the kitchen and smiling 
at her earnest sister-cook. Then she brushed off a 
smudge of flour from one flushed cheek and kissed 
Nancy on the nose. 

'That’s a 'thank you’ for my piece when it’s done. 
And never mind the flavoring. When folks are 
hungry, plain apple pie is a real treat!” 



















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